


grand pause

by burnt_pages



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Curses, Drinking, Found Family, Jaskier | Dandelion & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg Friendship, Jaskier | Dandelion-centric, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Multiple, Past Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Post-Episode: S01E06 Rare Species, Sign Language, Slow Burn, as i figure it all out, but everyone gets a turn on the metaphorical dissection table, we're building this shit from the ground up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:02:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 26,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26099851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnt_pages/pseuds/burnt_pages
Summary: grand pause: a symbol used in music that indicates to the musician to rest indefinitely. Exactly how long the rest lasts is up to the musician or the conductor.Jaskier doesn't make it to the coast. He loses a witcher, gains a drinking partner, loses again, and gains again.Well, everyone always says it's the journey, not the destination.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier | Dandelion & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Comments: 52
Kudos: 151





	1. Caesura

**Author's Note:**

> ooookay this is my first ever fic! And tbh I did not expect it to be for this fandom, but here we are. Sometimes your brain holds you hostage until you start writing the idea that's been floating around in your head for a while. 
> 
> Picks up after episode 6 and continues through 7 and 8 (...eventually), following show canon. Technically canon compliant? in that you could pretend all of this is happening off screen.
> 
> The drinking tag is there because the first few chapters involve some drinking and getting drunk, but it doesn't get any heavier than that.
> 
> I make no promises about update schedules because I know I can't follow that and also school, but I will finish this.
> 
> Anyway, I am going to fix things with my bare hands and make these idiots be friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> caesura: a metrical pause or break in a verse where one phrase ends and another phrase begins. In music, a caesura denotes a brief, silent pause, during which metrical time is not counted.

Jaskier doesn’t make it to the coast.

To be fair, he had every intention of going there – having a destination in mind, after all, had made it easier to pick his way down the mountain, had given him the smallest sense of purpose since-

Well. Since he lost his other one a few hours ago.

At least this is something with a clear goal, and he already sees step one of getting there: making his way to the tavern at the bottom of the mountain and getting _thoroughly_ sloshed. After that was done, then he could see about finding a good route to the coast.

But first, alcohol.

Or, first, getting off this _gods-forsaken mountain_.

The way down is quicker. It had still been morning when he left, and without having to worry about competing groups or the terror of the dwarfs’ shortcut, the going is easier. Downhill is nice, too, but feels a little ironic for his taste.

He might also be walking a touch faster than usual. Jaskier has no misconceptions about how his human speed and endurance compares to – compares to someone with _enhancements,_ but he likes to think that he’s gaining the upper hand in this case thanks to spite. It’s a thought Jaskier likes to think a lot in his life.

So maybe he’s hoping that he can walk off this stupid mountain fast enough that no one could catch up with him, enhanced or otherwise, thus minimizing his chances of an unpleasant encounter. Or maybe, he tells himself, he’s just looking forward to a good few pints of ale. It does mean that in his downtrodden hurry he had neglected to “get the rest of the story from the others”, but for once in his life, Jaskier can’t find it in himself to care all that much.

He doesn’t think he wants to write any songs about this little misadventure, dragon or no.

His heart does something funny in his chest when he sees Roach still near the head of the path where they’d started a few days ago. A vindictive part of him says _good_ . Another part says, _gods, it’s only been a few days._

The sun has just dipped behind the mountains, leaving enough retreating daylight to see him to the tavern, which is very nearby, and his legs ache anyway, and he really could just walk by.

Then Jaskier sighs, and shuffles his way over to Roach. He gives her a few gentle pats on the neck, says “I’ll miss you, girl”, and if his eyes are a little misty, well, then that’s between him and Roach. She bumps him back with her nose, and when Jaskier gives a small wet chuckle he knows it’s time to go. He’s losing the light.

\---

The third biggest downside to the Pensive Dragon this night is that it is crowded. The upside is that the ale is relatively cheap and easy to acquire. The second biggest downside is that, if he wants to rest his aching feet, it seems there’s really only one open seat, at a table tucked in a corner near the fireplace. It’s a prime spot, so Jaskier is surprised to see a single person there when he scans the room. Then the person registers, along with the first biggest downside to this tavern: the person glaring daggers at the room in general, sitting alone at the table with the only open seat, is Yennefer.

Jaskier stands for a few moments with a full tankard in hand, weighing his options. He decides that actually, he’s dealt with quite enough today, thank you very much, and curses Destiny for the thousandth time. Something in his leg sort of twinges in revenge. Jaskier’s brain says _fuck it_ , and he pushes his way over to Yennefer’s table and sits on the bench across from her.

If looks could kill, Jaskier would have died many years ago, and several times over. The stare Yennefer levels at him over her own mug looks like it could kill him with no magic involved. Jaskier has had worse and pays it no mind as he sips his drink.

“Jaskier,” Yennefer bites out.

“Yennefer,” he bites back.

“I’m here to drink alone. So fuck off.”

“Yeah, well, so am I. You just happen to have the last empty seat.”

She snorts. “Yes, quite on purpose. Most people can take a hint.”

Jaskier groans internally. He is very, very tired, and his nerves are frayed and raw. “Look, we both know there’s no love lost between us. I’m only here to get exceptionally drunk, as I’m guessing you are as well. So why don’t we sit here and ignore each other while we both pursue our individual yet similar goals.” He gives her a mock toast and sets his mug on the table with a thunk.

In response, she tosses back a good amount of ale and glares sideways at him the whole time. Her eyes shift off him to roam around the tavern, and Jaskier quietly sighs, hoping that maybe they really will ignore each other and he can pass the rest of this shitty night in some semblance of drunken peace.

Yennefer’s piercing gaze is back on Jaskier too soon. “Where’s your witcher?” she sneers. “You never seem to be too far from him.”

_If life could give me one blessing-_

“My life actually doesn’t revolve around him like yours seems to,” Jaskier snaps. “But no, he isn’t here. Good luck finding someone else to fuck.”

She’s staring at him harder now. Jaskier knows that he and Yennefer have never been on good terms - first impressions are hard to overcome, and he almost died several times during their first meeting - but he also knows he’s being needlessly cruel, lashing out from his own hurt. He also doesn’t care very much.

He swallows down some more ale. Yennefer is still studying him.

“Finally got tired of you, did he?” she grins unhappily.

“He got rid of you, first,” Jaskier mutters, failing to come up with a clever quip and wincing when he realizes what he’s just admitted to Yennefer of all people.

Yennefer looks offended at that. “ _I_ left _him_ . I’m the one who walked away from him, you idiot. It’s his own fault – oh. _Ah_.” She pauses. “He left you? For good?” she asks incredulously. “If I had known all it took to drive you away for good was to grunt a few times and say ‘fuck off’, I would’ve done it ages ago.”

“Well, he used many more words than that,” Jaskier grumbles.

“This is just rich,” she laughs bitterly. “Here you are, following him around for years – I mean, I’ve been running into you two for more than five years now, and every time I see you I’m surprised you’re still there. Oh, Jaskier, how does it feel to have wasted so much time like that? And then he finally uses his words to tell you to fuck off for good apparently, and you do!”

“Sorry, how are you any different? You’ve been fucking him every chance you get for years and finally figured out it’s all a waste.”

Jaskier thinks it might be time to backtrack on this conversation from how thunderous Yennefer’s face looks. Instead, bitter and wounded, he swipes another tankard from a passing barmaid and takes a sweet sip.

Suddenly Yennefer’s face clears. Jaskier watches as her defensive look fades and is replaced by… wary exhaustion.

“I suppose we both got fucked over by him in the end,” she seems to say to herself.

At this point, Jaskier isn’t sure why he keeps talking. He’s barely even tipsy, he hates Yennefer, he really doesn’t want to put his heartbreak on display, the list goes on. Yennefer didn’t _exactly_ make that last remark to him, but his mind recognizes the opening in her words. An opening for what, he isn’t quite sure yet.

“I bet he didn’t tell you that you’re the source of all his problems for the past twenty-two years,” Jaskier says, quietly enough that he could pass it off as saying it to himself.

Yennefer’s head snaps up from eyeing her tankard. “Did he really?” she asks. Her tone is light, but her focus is intense.

Jaskier gives a one-shouldered shrug and tries to match her tone. “He did use a lot of words for once, so the meaning was fairly clear.”

When he looks at her, she’s still staring at him, leaning slightly across the table.

“Well,” she says and sits back. “ _Did_ you cause all his problems?”

“No! I don’t need to – he causes most of them himself,” Jaskier rants indignantly. “I mean, he’s all ‘I don’t get involved in the affairs of men,’ except he does, all the time. And sure, maybe the djinn was a little bit my fault, but technically he was the one who released it since he got the wishes. And- and! And he’s the one who was looking for it in the first place and made his stupid wishes. And that’s just one incident.”

Yennefer is resting her chin in her hand, but Jaskier thinks she might be grinning behind her hand.

“The idiot does need to take some more responsibility for his problems,” she replies mildly, eyes distant. She seems to think something over, before continuing. “I’d wager he only told you to fuck off because he was angry with me and my response to our whole situation, and so he could go off to brood alone.”

“Mm, he does like to brood alone.”

“I don’t see how he’s allowed to be angry with me for choosing to leave anyway, after he took my choice in the first place,” Yennefer continues, gaining steam. “I’m not even sure how long I’ll be able to avoid him because of this stupid wish bullshit. Am I just _destined_ to continuously run into him wherever I go? Because that will become frustrating very quickly.”

“Not to mention awkward,” Jaskier says. He probably should’ve kept his mouth shut, because Yennefer is looking at him again with an indecipherable expression on her face. Then his brain processes her words. "Hang on, what wish?"

"Did you not know? No, of course not. When does he ever communicate." She huffs out a breath and pulls a new tankard from a tray as it passes. She downs about half of it before she speaks again. “In Rinde, his final wish was to tie our fates together. It's why we keep meeting.”

"Ah," Jaskier responds, as though Yennefer's answer makes any sense to him. Magic is far from his area of expertise, and the less he has to deal with it the better. It never ends well.

There is a quiet moment as they both drink and sit in their discontent.

"Did you know he has a Child Surprise he refuses to take responsibility for as well? If he's going to claim the Law of Surprise he should at least be prepared for the consequences," Yennefer says. Jaskier grunts in agreement, and their conversation spirals from there.

The rest of the night starts to slip from Jaskier’s mind thanks to a combination of fatigue and lots of alcohol. There was a good deal of griping about a certain witcher, which later mostly took the form of angry yelling. He doesn’t remember any crying, thankfully, but he also remembers Yennefer laughing, and Jaskier laughing with her, so it is possible the whole night was an alcohol-induced hallucination.

The last thing he remembers is Yennefer pausing in front of a wobbly portal to consider him, flipping him off and sticking out her tongue, and stepping through out of sight.

Jaskier wakes with a headache so pounding that he questions whether he has ever really had a hangover before this. He also finds a small box with a hinged lid in his pocket, and a note:

_Call me if you ever want to do that again. Don’t be annoying about it. Y._

So now he might be drinking buddies with a sorceress he hates.

He’s lost a witcher and gained… something, although he’s unsure if “gain” is the right word. It’s a word with very positive connotations, after all.

He refuses to stop and think it all over though. It has been a very strange and upsetting twenty-four hours, and if he stops to take it all in, he might not start moving again.

Jaskier gathers up his belongings, tucks the box back into his pocket, and heads for the coast.


	2. Modulation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> modulation: the process of changing from one key to another. The change from one tonality to another.

Yennefer tries not to regret things in life.

She has lived for a good number of years, and knows she has plenty more left if she's careful. She prefers not to linger on things like regret when she could better spend her time fixing whatever might cause regret in the first place.

Tonight, regret might yet be too strong of a word, but she is definitely on the verge of rethinking her recent decisions.

“Jaskier,” she asks lightly with a threat hovering underneath, “what am I doing here?”

“Well,” Jaskier slides a full mug towards her, “I’m getting drunk, and you sound miserable, so we’re both going to get drunk.”

“Remember when I said not to be annoying with the device I gave you?” She gives a doubtful sniff of the ale.

The device in question is an enchanted box, small enough to fit in the palm of one’s hand, with a hinged lid. Yennefer owns its twin, and opening the lid of one would activate the other so that a person could speak into one box and have their voice heard coming out of the second. The boxes had not been easy to come by and were best used for short urgent messages, but they might as well be put to use now, even if it wasn’t exactly the use she had originally envisioned for the boxes.

“Of course. That’s rather vague though, isn’t it?” Jaskier glances at her and winces at her expression. “Anyway, it’s been more than a week since you gave me that thing, which means that we’re probably both still miserable enough to get drunk together, but you haven’t spent enough consecutive time with me to want to kill me yet.”

Yennefer doesn’t reply immediately to that, because she’s angry at how much sense it actually makes. And the fact that he’s right. She’s mainly coping with the mountain disaster by ignoring that it ever happened, ignoring that she feels anything about it, and drinking whatever wine she can get her hands on.

Surprisingly, she’s finding that drinking alone is losing its charm. Jaskier had at least provided company that understood what she was drinking about and could commiserate with her. Drinking alone doesn’t lend itself well to ranting about your thoughts out loud, and she often ends up more miserable than she started.

“No one forced you to answer and portal here,” Jaskier says into his mug.

Yennefer punches his arm, which shocks both of them. There’s barely any strength behind it, but Jaskier spills a bit of his drink and looks at her in surprise, and Yennefer plays it off by taking the first sip of her own drink.

“Last time, I believe we said some… unkind and potentially untrue things about a certain witcher.”

“Yes, but he wasn’t there to hear it, so no harm no foul?” Jaskier replies a little guiltily. “Besides, at least half of it was definitely true, and the other half has escaped my memory.”

“So we’re getting drunk and complaining about him again?”

“Did you have a better plan in mind?”

Yennefer hums. “Do you know how many times he wanted me to turn back on the mountain?”

\---

The number of pints they’ve had is starting to slip from Yennefer when her curiosity gets the better of her.

“Why did you follow him so far and for so long?”

“Adventure,” Jaskier says breezily. “Song-writing material. For fun. Take your pick.”

“You could have travelled on your own,” she counters. “Or found someone else, if you were both desperate enough. Why _him_?”

He takes a swig of his ale. “Because he was my friend. So I thought.”

It’s barely half an answer, but she can’t find it in herself to prod him any further. Yennefer could be considered an expert on avoiding giving an answer to questions that seem simple, so she recognizes the symptoms.

“Why did you leave him?” Jaskier asks in return. “I thought you loved each other or something.”

She exhales in frustration. “Did we though? How am I supposed to know?”

That’s the conundrum she has been stuck contemplating since the mountain, and she’d rather avoid thinking about it altogether.

“Because of the wish?”

“Yes,” she snaps, and deflects. “You’re a bard, aren’t you supposed to be providing the entertainment in taverns like this?” She gestures with her mug. If it was fuller, her drink would have sloshed over the side, but it’s near empty. She frowns and waves a barmaid down.

“What a subtle way to change the topic. And no. I have a bit of coin saved up yet. Don’t feel much like performing, either.”

“But you’re a bard,” she elegantly points out.

“And you’re a witch, but I don’t see you cursing people and brewing poisons all the time.”

“You have spectacularly missed the point of what I do. And I don’t believe there are places that have laws against being a bard.”

“People have thrown food at me in the past…”

“Oh, and somehow that’s comparable to being killed because I understand the forces of chaos better than you do,” she spits back.

“Maybe they hate you not for your profession, but because you really are a witch,” Jaskier retorts. 

“I should’ve let that djinn choke you to death,” she hisess, standing up and leaning on the table to stop herself from wobbling. She might be shouting a bit. The volume of her voice is hard to determine between the rushing in her ears and the noise from the rest of the tavern. “I knew this was a mistake.”

Yennefer decides she's had enough and cuts their conversation there before it can devolve even further, so she storms out into the crisp night air and keeps walking until the lights of the town are no longer illuminating the dark around her. She opens a portal into the house she has temporarily liberated from its owners and drops into a plush chair.

She wishes she had brought her tankard with her. The wine cellar is woefully sparse. 

She huffs out an angry breath and sinks further into the chair. Stupid annoying bards and their stupid words and their stupid ideas about drinking with company. He didn’t have to _use_ the box she gave him if they were just going to yell at each other instead of yelling about the stupid things the witcher had done.

She covers her face with her hand. Yennefer detests self-awareness on principle, but. But. But they might have redirected their anger with the witcher at each other instead. Hence the yelling.

Drinking with the bard the first time had been… enjoyable, though she would rather kiss Tissaia’s feet than admit that to Jaskier.

_Well, that’s enough thinking about that,_ she chastises herself, and commits to sulking for the rest of the evening.

\---

It’s another ten days before Jaskier calls her again. Not that Yennefer is counting.

It’s only because she can’t find anything better to do that she shows up.

He’s at a tavern a few towns to the south of the last one they met in. The evening is turning fully into night - Yennefer was surprised by how sober Jaskier sounded when he had called. She doesn’t know what to expect when she stalks in, so she enters with her guard up.

The sight that greets Yennefer throws her for a second. The last time, Jaskier had already been seated and waiting for her with two full tankards. Now, he’s nearly the first thing she spots, because he’s moving around the room, singing and playing his lute.

She grabs a drink, slides into an empty seat, and waits.

Jaskier’s playing is unfamiliar to her. Yennefer has maybe heard him play once or twice, but she hadn’t paid attention. And it certainly wasn’t a performance like this.

Nearly everyone in the room is watching him or singing along or clapping or, at the very least, smiling. He flits about playing some upbeat song that seems popular. The song itself is nothing special, but she has to admit that Jaskier is good. His lute-playing and singing are obviously skilled, and he knows how to keep a crowd entertained.

There’s almost what she would describe as a hollowness to it all though. When he smiles, it doesn’t reach his eyes. His voice is most likely better than anything these townspeople have ever heard and all the emotions you would expect in a song are there, but it’s as if he has no personal investment in what he’s playing. Yennefer isn’t necessarily one for sitting around and watching musical performances, but she’s seen enough to know what they are generally like. And she can acknowledge that Jaskier does have something of a bardic reputation.

So perhaps she expected more.

Her thoughts are interrupted by the bard himself.

"I'd like to thank all you lovely people for being such a wonderful audience! However, I must take my leave and retire for the evening. Thank you and have a good night!" He gives a sweeping bow to the applause and cheers of the patrons, and when their attention has shifted back to their idle conversations, Jaskier packs away his lute and slides over to Yennefer's table.

She gives a few claps in mock applause. "So you've played this time."

"Hello, Yennefer." He might be smiling, or it might be a grimace.

"Jaskier." He doesn't reply in her expectant pause. "Tell me why I’m here again.”

The room is filled with noise around them, but it’s as though a bubble has encased their table and separated it from the rest of the world.

Jaskier sighs, drumming his fingers on the sides of his mug. Several moments pass where Yennefer is distinctly aware of the happiness and normalcy of the other people in this tavern. “I don’t necessarily like you.”

“Oh, what a wonderful start. Shall I just leave now?”

“I wasn’t finished,” he says with a small quirk to his lips. “I don’t necessarily like you, and I’m sure you could say the same. But,” he exhales again, “we’ve both had enough hurt. And I’d rather not turn it on each other and put ourselves through more of it.”

“Why does it matter?” she asks, more as a reflex than anything.

“Because I enjoy drinking with you.” Jaskier is still faintly smiling, like he’s told a joke to himself.

He says it so plainly that she’s a bit taken aback by it, unable to tell if his reply is so easy because he is joking in some way, or because he really does enjoy drinking with her.

“Yes, probably because I’m your only option,” she snorts when she finds her voice after a few seconds. She doesn’t mean it all that unkindly, though. This night is becoming more and more unexpected in the most mundane way possible. A few weeks ago she had been hunting a dragon, arguing about a magic djinn wish, and breaking up with a witcher. Now she’s sitting in a tavern and talking about _feelings_.

“Anyway, maybe we can avoid certain… sore subjects in the future?”

“Sore subjects,” she repeats skeptically.

Jaskier looks at the ceiling and hums. “Geralt and our… relationships with him.”

Oh. Sore subjects. That is mainly what had caused them to snap at each other, as much as she remembers. Jaskier had asked about the wish, and her and Geralt. And she had asked Jaskier about him and Geralt.

Sore subjects indeed.

“Fine,” she says. “But we only got along so well the first time because we were criticizing the witcher together.”

“Yennefer. I don’t think we’ve ever even had a proper conversation,” he replies, and the smile is back. “There has to be _loads_ for us to talk about without having to touch on sore subjects. And,” he continues, lifting his mug, “we have some fine alcohol to help us along.”

She waits for Jaskier to finish taking a sip, and then she keeps waiting. His eyes flit to her and out to the rest of the room a few times. It takes her a second to see that they're both waiting for the other one to start the conversation. 

Where does she even start? She doesn't really care about Jaskier all that much, and she certainly isn't invested in small talk. Yennefer isn't certain she knows what small talk is anyway, or how to engage in it.

"I told you about the wish?" she blurts out in the end.

Jaskier snorts. “Yes, I got the gist of it. Why?”

“Just- you mentioned it last time. I wasn’t sure you actually knew about it,” she says. Jaskier gives her a weird look. “What?”

“You told me about it the first time we drank together. Multiple times, in quite extensive detail, and with plenty of your own _very_ expressive opinions on it-”

“Yes, alright,” she huffs. “That might ring a bell.”

Jaskier doesn’t respond immediately, just lifts an eyebrow. “How drunk were you when I came in? You couldn’t have gotten there much faster than me, I only left a few minutes behind you.”

Yennefer takes a small sip of her drink. She doesn’t _regret_ how she reacted right after the mountain, but she does feel… a little sheepish. She tries her best to not show it, as always. “I portaled back, of course. Much faster.”

It doesn’t fully answer his question, but Jaskier seems to fill in the gaps from there, based on his quiet “ah” and the smirk that follows.

Another silent pause passes between them as they both gauge each other and the conversation.

Jaskier speaks up this time, awkward and rushed. “To be honest, and only because you sort of brought it up, I, uh, I didn’t know the wish was what you fought about. On the mountain.”

She narrows her eyes but lets him continue to walk on thin ice. 

“I didn’t know about it really until you told me. I thought-” He takes a deep breath and lets the rest out all jumbled together. “I thought you were fighting because you were pregnant.”

Yennefer is shocked beyond words, beyond thought even. It is an extremely unusual feeling for her.

Then every ridiculous angle of Jaskier’s sentence hits her, and her breath whooshes out into laughter, and she keeps laughing, harder than she has in… ever, maybe. There are tears squeezing out of the corners of her eyes, and her stomach is starting to hurt, and it feels so _good_.

“Look, it was a perfectly reasonable interpretation of that fight!” Jaskier says, but he’s saying it through his own laughter, eyes bright and lips unable to hold back a grin.

“ _Jaskier,_ ” Yennefer says with what little breath she has. She has to stop to let out a few more laughs and wipe her eyes. “Jaskier, I can’t even get pregnant.” And it doesn’t sting too much when she says it.

“You two were talking about children and _responsibility_ and whatnot, what was I supposed to think!” Jaskier gestures wildly as he speaks. His smile does not fade. “I simply connected the dots that were presented to me.”

“You connected fuck all!” she throws back playfully.

That sets them snickering again, and their night passes, to Yennefer’s surprise, amiably. There is awkward small talk and odd pauses, but they hold something approximate to a stilted conversation. When they part for the night, Yennefer is far less drunk than expected, and she feels… content? She thinks this feeling is contentment. 

She falls asleep easily and sleeps peacefully.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magic works how I want it to because I said so. Yes I gave them low tech magic cell phones.


	3. Niente

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> niente: “nothing”, barely audible, dying away

Jaskier arrives at Oxenfurt with chill winter air following close on his heels. He greets all the right old acquaintances and such, gets himself set up with a few guest lectures, acquires room and board, and falls face-first into bed.

He lays underneath the warm covers and watches his first snowfall of the season the next morning as the flakes drift lightly by the window. It’s not quite where he wants to be, but traveling a little further to somewhere more coastal will have to wait until spring arrives.

The days suddenly become hushed as they do every winter. Jaskier slips into the familiar stillness. He gives his lectures, he talks to old friends, he wanders through the libraries and loses himself in stacks of books.

Apart from a few demonstrations, he does not compose. 

He tries. He sits at the desk in his room with blank pages in front of him and a new quill in his hand. The tangle of words inside of him refuses to be straightened into linear lyrics. Words are half-written and crossed out.

He picks up his lute and sits on the edge of the bed, facing out the window. He tries to just let the music and the words flow naturally as they so often do. His fingers pick out scales and disconnected chords. He parts his lips to sing something new, and the air dies in his lungs.

The last song he wrote was  _ Her Sweet Kiss _ .

It’s happened before where he’s had dry spells and writer’s block and even burnout, but never for much time. He’s had plenty of material to work with for so long.

Jaskier sighs and closes his eyes, lets his hands wander over his lute, aimlessly plucking across the strings. There’s no point in forcing songs that don’t want to be written right now.

Muscle memory takes over, and he’s a fourth of the way through a song before he brings his focus back and hears himself playing  _ Toss A Coin _ .

His heart stutters and his hands seize, stopping the sound abruptly. Silence rings out in the small room. He carefully breathes again, exhales and gently sets his lute aside.

There is less distraction here. He isn’t traveling, he doesn’t have to perform to earn money or a room, his duties here are minimal. Winter has set in now, discouraging long forays into the outdoors. 

There are short days and long nights. Everything is quiet and muffled by cold and snow. 

It should be perfect for composing. It should be time for him to commit to song his travels from the past year, everything he had written down without the time needed to truly delve into it. 

More often than not, his journal sits closed on the desk.

Jaskier attends dinners and small performances that are held to keep people close and get them all through the winter. He joins in the conversations easily, passes advice to colleagues and listens to students ramble on. When asked, he talks about his own journeys. He keeps these stories short.

It is nice to be back in an environment so familiar to him. Oxenfurt is abundant with warmth and happiness and music and laughter.

But his heart still aches. There are too many gaps, too much unmoving quiet.

Looking at these students passing by reminds him of years ago when he was freshly graduated. Jaskier sees their ambitions growing along with their skill and their pride. He remembers being the same way, ready to face the world and so sure that he had already learned so much about it.

And then he had ended up in Posada, and his illusions had been shattered. The realities of the world around him had come more into focus then, and he is grateful for it. And yet so often, reality is not what people want.

Even here, in a place of knowledge and learning, there are misconceptions. They still talk about the elves as though they have palaces full of wealth and power. He smiles blandly and throws in his two cents where he can. His skin feels like it's itching. 

More than once, he is specifically sought out for stories of his travels. Jaskier is aware that he is… considered an oddity. Many bards find courts to reside in, and others who travel tend not to be on the road for as much of the year as he is and meet with less success. People tire of adventure and shitty taverns and less than stellar pay. And loneliness.

He gets introduced along the lines of “And this here is Jaskier, wonderful student some years ago, could be an amazing professor but alas, we rarely ever see him for all his traveling!”

The students seem to enjoy his few lectures though, and he helps them nurture their skills as he tries to impart as much wisdom as he can to them.

On nights where he has no obligations and too many unfinished melodies in his mind, Jaskier will occasionally hold Yennefer’s strange magic box and think about how easy it would be to flip open the lid. He hasn’t yet. Talking himself out of it is never too difficult - he and Yennefer aren’t exactly  _ friends _ , and there are plenty of other people in Oxenfurt who could provide company in a variety of capacities.

He doesn’t take advantage of that latter fact either.

But after so much time traveling with one person and being around people in general, he simply needs some time to himself. Self-care and all that.

_ Wallowing, _ his mind supplies, and Jaskier tells his mind to shut up.

Life catches up with him surprisingly slow for once. It never seems to take long for the world to remind Jaskier of the effects of his actions or of his general fragile existence. But three weeks pass at Oxenfurt when his participation is requested for something more than a one-off performance.

_ Just a few songs, _ he is told,  _ a small performance with open attendance for the locals. Something to brighten the winter and help us get through, and it will be a good opportunity for the students to test themselves and show off a bit, and you’d be such a good demonstration for them,  _ and Jaskier wearily agrees before his ear can be talked off.

The hall that night is warm and bright, full of laughter and food and music. It is a state so natural to Oxenfurt. Jaskier applauds nervous students who grin shakily yet genuinely after their performances, and he watches professors and alumni show off trickier songs. 

His own performance is a bit of a blur. It's only a few songs, nowhere close to the full sets he's used to. He switches between some of his popular songs and some that are technically brilliant but tend to be unappreciated by the masses. He even throws in a debut of  _ Her Sweet Kiss  _ near the end, mostly just to get it out of his system.

It feels like he's going through the motions though, in a dance he has done more times than he can reliably count. It's all second nature at this point.

Jaskier prides himself on infusing his performances with his personality and emotion, but it's a difficult thing to do when he feels this… drained. When he's trying very hard to keep everything he's feeling under lock and key so he won't get stuck drowning in it.

He smiles and bows and says his thanks before stepping down from the stage, exhausted in a way he rarely is after a performance. So Jaskier weaves his way through the crowded hall, accepting the praises thrown his way, all the while heading for the door.

The hallway outside is cool and empty, the sounds of the hall behind now muffled. He stands for a moment just to take a few deep breaths. 

Jaskier has barely gone a few steps when the door behind him squeaks open. A burst of crowded noise slips through and fades.

"Bard," a woman's voice calls when it is quiet again, haughty like she expects to not only be listened to automatically, but obeyed as well.

She is not a familiar face. Not someone he's seen while staying here the past few weeks, so she could have come from a nearby town. She's young and beautiful, of course, but her age is impossible to tell. Her presence makes the hair on Jaskier's arms and the back of his neck raise like the moments before a thunder storm. She reminds him of Yennefer - powerful, knows what she wants, only interested in you as long as she thinks she can pull some new nugget of knowledge from your body and doesn't much care whether you're alive or dead when she does it.

A mage then.

Jaskier is aware of how little he can do against magic. He checks the small dagger at his belt anyway. He would rather not cough up his own blood again if he can avoid it.

"You sing about heartbreak as though you are well acquainted with it," she says when Jaskier half-turns to her.

"It's part of the job," he smiles politely while wondering what the hell she wants and trying to guess which body part he should protect first. More than that, he wants her to lose interest and go away.

She gives an empty smile back. "You have recent experience with heartbreak. I can tell. Your singing sounds sad. I can help you."

Jaskier's fingers tighten on his dagger. "Help" could be of a magical nature, or a… physical one. Either way, he doesn't want it. He knows better than to mess around with mages.

"Thank you for the offer, but I'll have to decline."

"It wasn't an offer," she replies, her expression just this side of predatory. Jaskier's stomach drops. He thinks he understands how rabbits feel when foxes are near, and he prepares to bolt in a similar way. Only the mage's stare is so intense. It feels as though he is pinned in place.

Too quickly, the woman unclasps her hands and reaches towards him, face twisted in concentration, and she curls her fingers and drags her hands back in as if pulling something to her.

"You sing so sweetly, little bard," she says gasping a bit, "but so sadly. Best not to sing all that pain, I think. But don't worry, I've left a solution for your heartbreak too - I'm very generous that way - in the form of a traditional true-love's kiss."

She looks satisfied as she strides past him, and Jaskier takes several sideways steps to keep distance between them. The mage turns a corner at the same time Jaskier's brain catches up. He runs to follow, getting ready to yell questions after her, but stops when the next hallway is empty.

“What the fuck,” Jaskier says. Or rather, tries to say.

His voice makes no sound.

He can feel his throat moving, can feel the words shaped in his mouth and pushed out through his lips.

And there’s no sound to them.

For one horrible moment, it’s like the day with the djinn all over again. Panic sets in swiftly, thoughts of choking on blood filling his mind. Jaskier doubles over and gasps in air on instinct.

But when he reaches, his neck is not swollen under his hand. There is no taste of blood, no urge to cough, no difficulty in breathing apart from his fear. No pain. Nothing else has happened to him.

He’s lost his voice.

He can’t talk. He can’t  _ sing. _ How is he supposed to-

It’s magic. Obviously.

As soon as the thought crosses his mind, Jaskier is tearing through the hallways toward his room, already picturing his desk where Yennefer's box sits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took me so much longer than I thought because of *incoherent screaming about timelines* which is probably also the title of my theoretical autobiography on writing.  
> Anyway thanks for reading and thank you to everyone who has left kudos!!!


	4. Senza

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> senza: without

Yennefer can hear Jaskier's box rattling around somewhere nearby. The few times this had happened before, it had been a minor annoyance at worst. Now she contemplates the feasibility of traveling backwards in time and stopping herself from ever picking up this pair of boxes. An idea to file away and explore at a later time.

She flips through a few uninteresting pages and tosses a book aside to a growing stack. Another book is selected and the title on the spine alone is enough to land it in the same pile. The next one she pulls off the shelf - now where did _this_ come from? She cracks it open with a small puff of dust and starts scanning the lines-

That infernal box. Will not. Shut up.

“I’m busy!” Yennefer yells to no one and throws her head back. “Melitele preserve me, you give a bard a box and-”

The mildly interesting and potentially useful book gets unceremoniously shoved back on the shelf. Yennefer stalks towards the kitchen. She is almost certain she left the box somewhere there during her organizing spree.

She has to yank open a few cabinets before she finds it innocently sitting beside some plates and buzzing away. 

“The hell do you want, Jaskier,” she growls. He better have found some _really_ good alcohol.

There is no response from the other end.

Yennefer sighs very exaggeratedly. Either he's messing around or Jaskier has accidentally opened the box. An annoyance no matter what, she's sure.

"Jaskierrrrrr. Are you there?"

A noise like a single clap comes across, followed by more claps in short bursts. Yennefer wants to stab something. It’s too early for drinking - but no, it is dark outside. Seems she spent more of the day tearing apart this house than she thought, and there’s still plenty more to go.

"Jaskier,” she says with venomous sweetness, “assuming you are actually on the other end and this is an intentional call, clap once for yes and twice for no. Is this Jaskier?"

A single clap.

Fine. She'll play along.

"Is this a joke?"

Two quick claps. She frowns.

"You called on purpose?" One clap.

"Why can't you just speak? Hang on, yes, I know." The silence on the other end is unnerving. She couldn’t admit to knowing Jaskier well, what with them having met only briefly over the years and drinking together a mere four times now, but he is not a man of few words, she knows that much.

_He’s in Oxenfurt right now_ , her mind supplies, and she’s halfway to shooing the thought away when several implications hit her, the first being _when the hell did she start paying attention to what Jaskier said during their drinking nights._ Yennefer quickly rewinds time in her head, and there it is, she does remember-

_“-unless you are stupid enough to travel during the winter.”_

_It’s maybe a week or so after their third meeting, the one that had gone strangely well, and she’s only here to see if miracles can happen twice. Not for any other reason._

_“No, heading back to Oxenfurt, where my presence will be much more appreciated than here,” Jaskier replies in that way that means he’s fucking with her. “They’ll be positively desperate for me, they’ll say ‘Jaskier play your ballads for us, Jaskier give lectures for us, Jaskier tell us how truly awful that one witch is, oh yes what was her name-’”_

_“And then after five minutes they’ll all go back to praising - what’s his name? Ah, Valdo Marx, that famous, wonderful bard, and saying ‘Jaskier? No, nowhere near as good- I mean, ‘Jaskier’ isn’t even a real name-’”_

_And that had sent Jaskier off ranting over her while she had tried to hold in her laughter enough to keep poking at him-_

And now nearly a month has gone by. So he must be there, busy with his lectures and songwriting or whatever, doing his best to annoy the rest of the Continent.

"Jaskier," she asks, "is something wrong?"

An immediate response. One loud clap.

Her stomach drops slightly in response, but she reminds herself that there is still the possibility that Jaskier is simply fucking with her. No reason for her to worry. Oxenfurt is safe, anyway. He’s probably just bored and asking her for another drinking session. Or he’s pissed off the wrong person and wants something magicked back to normal.

Yennefer pinches her nose and thinks about the chaotic state she’s leaving the library in. If he’s refusing to talk for whatever reason, then she’ll have to go to him. And maybe punch him in the face. It would be very cathartic.

"Fine. Stay there and I'll come to you and you can tell me what you've gotten yourself into. This better not be a joke, Jaskier."

Yennefer waits for the single clap in response and snaps the box shut. If this is all for nothing and Jaskier isn't really in trouble, she would be happy to dig his grave for him and personally deposit his body into it.

There is a feeling in her gut though, and gut feelings are too often right. It’s the feeling before something important happens, usually before something messy and destructive and bad. 

It’s close to the feeling she gets around Geralt. The feeling that something is going to go wrong, or already has.

Yennefer shakes her head, throws her hair behind her shoulders. She pictures the other box, conjures up the shape of its energy from memory, feels in her mind its place in the world. Then she bends chaos into a portal and steps through.

On the other side is a relatively plain room. It has some nice touches - a bed that looks comfortable, a solid desk, a large window overlooking a snowy courtyard. She recognizes the twin box on the desk next to a well-worn journal.

Jaskier is pacing, fidgeting with his hands. His head snaps up at her arrival and he crosses the few steps between the two of them. Then he's talking and making wide gestures, except… his mouth is moving, but his words make no sound. He motions to his throat a lot.

Jaskier talks like everyone else breathes and moves as constantly as the sun. The sight without the sound is like standing before ocean waves that silently break on the beach.

More off-putting than that is how Jaskier looks. Yennefer thought she had seen Jaskier scared before. Admittedly he held it together much better than many other people would, but she had still seen him scared - of her in Rinde, of that creature on the way up the mountain, on the dwarfs' shortcut. 

She was wrong, though. Whatever fear she had seen in him then was absolutely nothing compared to what she sees now.

"Jaskier. Jaskier!" Yennefer grabs his shoulders to hold him in place and calm him for a moment. She stares him in the eyes, then gets thrown again when she sees how damp they are. It makes her falter, completely unsure of how to deal with that, but she plunges bluntly forward. "Tell me what happened."

He shakes his head furiously and taps his throat. She gathers that he can't speak, or is unwilling to.

"Paper, then. You have paper and something to write with?"

Jaskier nods. He goes to the journal on the desk and sets to writing frantically.

Through the smudges and the hurried handwriting, she reads the fragments he writes.

_Met a sorceress. Think she cursed me. I can't speak._

"How long ago?" Yennefer demands, mind already racing far ahead.

_Fifteen minutes at most?_

"Keep the paper handy."

It's quick work to open a portal back to the house she's staying in. She pushes Jaskier in before her and follows through to the study she's converted to a workroom. Immediately Yennefer strides away to the set of shelves she filled with various ingredients and materials and finished potions and such.

"Start writing down everything that happened," she tells Jaskier, waving a hand at a nearby desk. 

Yennefer very pointedly does not think about the first time she met Jaskier. At least there's no blood this time. At least -

As she reaches for a bottle, for a single stretched-out moment she watches her hand shake. 

Then Yennefer pulls the first of several bottles from the shelves, twists off one of the rings she is wearing, throws open the doors that lead into the library, and gets to work on the first few solutions she has already come up with to lift whatever curse has been cast on Jaskier.

\---

Hours later, Yennefer shouts wordlessly in frustration and slams a book shut, turning away from the table. She had long ago run out of the simple solutions and the more difficult ones soon after. All that had been left was to turn to the few books of magic she had found in the library.

It hadn't taken more than a few minutes for Jaskier to scratch out an abbreviated version of what had happened to him. After scanning through his words quickly, Yennefer's heart had sunk. Some spells and curses could be counteracted if you got there fast enough to stop it, like with the djinn. Some were a matter of having enough power to lift it. And some, the ones that were tricky and a pain in the ass, could not be lifted until specific conditions were met by the victim. And for those there was nothing she could do, no matter how quickly she had gotten to Jaskier, no matter how powerful she was.

Damn if Yennefer wasn't going to try though. If she could figure out how to lift a curse with conditions, it would be a highly notable feat of magic.

And the stupid clause of "true-love's kiss" had some wiggle room. Not nearly as much as she would like, but maybe enough to work with given time.

But as Yennefer had worked it had become increasingly clear, with each failed attempt to lift the curse, that she could not break this one.

"Jaskier," she says.

She hears a pen scratching behind her and turns back to see Jaskier slide a piece of paper to her.

_I know. Thank you for trying anyway._

She throws herself down into the chair across from him. "But it didn't _work._ You're still cursed."

In response, Jaskier simply taps the paper already in front of her with a sad smile.

Something about that fills her with anger. Every problem _must_ have a solution and Yennefer is going to fucking find this one.

"Fine. We do this the long way then, follow the curse, true-love's kiss or whatever. Who do you love, Jaskier? There has to be some lord or lady or noble you've bedded who caught your eye."

Jaskier starts and stares at her, then shakes his head. He doesn't stop looking at her, eyes widening slightly.

"Jaskier, the faster you tell me whoever it is, the faster we can find them and you can kiss them and lift your curse," she says, exasperated. "This isn't hard to understand. Honestly, I couldn't care less who it is, and I don't see what you gain from not telling me. Then you can go back to annoying the Continent with your songs…"

The past few months skip through her mind. The mountain, and their first miserable night after it. Jaskier's words having a similar weight and hidden hurt to her own. Jaskier spent twenty-two years following one man and putting up with that man's shit until very recently. 

Oh.

"Oh, Jaskier," she says, because what else can she say? Yennefer has been there and done that. She has loved and lost and hurt because of that man. And in the end, she had to leave with both their hearts broken. She knows every reason to warn Jaskier away from this as much as she knows that Jaskier is aware of many of those reasons.

Yennefer also knows almost every reason Jaskier had to fall in love in the first place despite everything.

Her heart aches. She's a little surprised it can still do that after everything she's done to try to drown it. But it aches, both for her and for Jaskier, for having tied their fates in different ways to the same man. Love is a very stupid game that Yennefer isn't sure she sees the point in playing anymore.

"Jaskier," she says, leaning towards him over the table so she won't have to speak as loud. "For the whole true-love's kiss thing to work, it has to be mutual. There have been times where it didn't work." She raises a hand when he reaches for his pen. "I'm only saying this to… prepare you. If this is the solution, then it's worth at least trying. I can find him, and-"

Jaskier shoves a hastily-written note at her. 

_Won't work._

Before she can respond, he gives her another.

_He doesn't feel the same._

"Jaskier-" she starts.

He shakes his head again, standing up from the table.

"Jaskier, you don't know-" She stands up as well, braces her hands on the table. "You won't be able to talk. If you don't try, you won't be able to sing! You would give that up out of fear?"

Jaskier walks out and shuts the door behind him.

Yennefer can't really blame him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've listened to "her sweet kiss" so many times I think spotify is going to start asking me if I'm okay.  
> Also god knows how many times I've edited what I've written so if you see any glaring mistakes feel free to point them out.  
> Thanks for reading!


	5. Sob

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sob: an ornamentation used in lute playing. It is achieved by lightening the pressure that the finger of the left hand is putting on the string just after the string is plucked, thus creating a sob-like effect on the tone of the note.

Jaskier lets himself cry for the first time in a while. He’s never had much of a reason to in recent years and now it’s being made up for by jumping him all at once.

It's a very quiet cry, as his sobs also seem to be affected by the curse and don't make noise, a realization which only makes him cry harder.

He'll never be able to sing again. Half of his livelihood, and beyond that, a large part of what gives him joy - gone. He won't sing new lyrics he's written, he won't perform for taverns and courts, he won't improvise short songs while traveling. No more singing of heroics and heartbreak.

He can still play his lute of course, but he will no longer be able to provide his own accompaniment with his voice. Jaskier will be missing a half of his performance, of his songs. He can only play so many lyricless songs before either he goes mad or his audience does. Now, it's all he will have.

And everything of course leads back to the mountain, the place that severed his heart . Every feeling he's buried so he doesn't have to think about it, so it doesn't distract him, it all comes tumbling out.

Had Geralt hated him all those years and never told him until that day? Had it all just festered until Geralt finally snapped? Jaskier finds that hard to believe - they had been friends. Or maybe Jaskier had only thought they'd been friends. And how could Geralt blame him for all of his problems! Jaskier didn't even know what the fuck had all happened on the mountain, and yet somehow that was apparently his fault along with everything else they had been through.

They had fights before, had yelled at each other before. But never like that. Never with such finality.

And Jaskier didn't know what to do with that.

He wasn't a stranger to being unwanted. When it happened before, he had managed to pick himself up and brush the experience off rather quickly, knowing there was more out in the world for him. 

This time was different in that Geralt had never actually said he wanted Jaskier around, nor the opposite, but Jaskier had thought it was implied. In the steady way that Geralt never left him behind even though Roach could far outpace Jaskier. In the quiet nights under the stars, or when Jaskier stopped his hands from shaking to help patch up an injury, or how Geralt would stop in a town and pretend they were only there to look for a job and not because Jaskier needed something. In the way Jaskier tracked Geralt down in the spring, and Geralt would let him.

In the many moments and years they had shared together. Jaskier had always thought that whatever they had was at least mutual, even as he grew aware of the unmatched depths of his own feelings.

And then he had walked down a mountain by himself.

Living with his love tucked close to his heart had seemed manageable, harmless for nothing would ever come of it. Having something small had seemed better than asking for more and losing it all. Now tethering his heart had cost Jaskier his voice.

The image of Geralt’s face, twisted in rage, will wound him for a very long time.

Jaskier loses track of time, but his tears eventually run dry. It is cathartic, at least, if draining, and he isn't carrying the huge mess of frustrated-heartbroken-angry-pained-confused feelings for once.

He picks up his thoughts slowly, wiping away the remains of his tears. Performing is out of the question in his current… condition, so there goes his income. But the terms of the curse are unacceptable. If he could find the sorceress who cursed him in the first place, perhaps he could convince her to lift it. Which requires finding her, which is virtually impossible.

It's a dead end.

It cannot be a dead end.

The cost is too high for him, though. Jaskier knows he isn't always as careful with his heart as he maybe should be, but even he will not risk it this time. He isn’t quite foolish enough to hand Geralt another opportunity to crush him.

Before his thoughts can spiral down that road again, he hears a door creak open and closed. A spark flares and catches a lamp.

Yennefer stands with one hand raised and takes in the room. It's less extravagant than the other bedrooms Jaskier had passed, but the rug beneath him is thick and soft and the bed he's resting his back against is rather plush.

Her eyes are as piercing as ever, as though they could cut right through his mind. Jaskier picks at some imaginary lint on his knee and half-watches Yennefer come sit next to him with a casual air, carefully smoothing her skirts down as she lowers herself to the floor and stretches her legs out. She sets his journal and pen in the space between them, neither of them looking at the other except occasionally out of the corner of their eyes.

Midnight has come and gone hours ago now. The windows in the room let in only darkness and silence, held back by the one illuminated lamp. 

"What are you going to do now?" 

It's the questions he is circling around and trying to avoid so he won't have to think about the answer he doesn't have.

He opens the journal to a blank page and writes.

_ Do you know handspeech? _

It's the favored communication for those who are deaf, hard of hearing, mute, or would otherwise need it, using hand signals and motions. Any decent school teaches the language comprehensively, though most people know enough to get through a conversation as it also tends to crop up in situations where it would be difficult to hear spoken words or inconvenient to make noise. Jaskier had picked some up in his childhood, and his time at Oxenfurt had substantially filled in the gaps.

_ Of course,  _ Yennefer signs as an answer.

So he closes the journal and places it to the side, leaving his hands free.

_ Well, I can't exactly earn money like this,  _ he signs with a bitter smile in response to her question.

Yennefer stares at him for a long moment, but her eyes go distant like she's looking through him instead.  _ I can return you to Oxenfurt. _

He’s been considering that already, but something about that thought makes Jaskier’s heart twist. He loves Oxenfurt, but… people whispered and stared and occasionally asked rather invasive questions and begged him to play certain songs. Oxenfurt is somehow less haven and more a reminder of what he does not have.

_ Or you could stay here,  _ she says, eyes refocusing.  _ For a bit.  _

It is a generosity that Jaskier is not expecting.

_ Only to see if there's some other solution to your curse,  _ Yennefer clarifies quickly.  _ I might be able to ask a few other mages if they have any ideas I haven't tried yet. It won’t be for long, and I'm not making any promises- _

_ Okay _ , Jaskier signs, and her hands pause.

_ Okay,  _ he repeats, and quirks his lips.  _ I'll stay here for a bit. Since you're offering, and since I don't really have anywhere else to be. _

He cannot imagine what made her offer, and he’s at just as much of a loss as to why he’s accepting. He doesn't expect Yennefer to turn up any other solutions, but there's no harm in at least sticking around to see if something happens.

More than that, he's tired, and he can't think about the future right now. Staying here gives him some sort of short-term plan. He and Yennefer tolerate each other as evidenced by their few nights out, so Jaskier figures his chances of survival here are about the same as they would be anywhere else.

He can stay here for a bit, and when nothing else turns up for his curse and he decides on what to do next, he can move on. Somehow.

_ How did you get this house, anyway?  _ Jaskier asks, because now Yennefer seems a little stunned by his agreement just as he was stunned by her offer.  _ Does being a mage pay so well? Should I consider a career change? Or is there a naked mayor in here I haven’t run into yet? _

_ Like you could make it as a mage,  _ she rolls her eyes as she signs.  _ You’d be an eel in two seconds, and you wouldn’t even make a useful one. _

_ Sorry, what? _

_ But no, no mayor this time.  _ She tilts her head back and forth, considering.  _ I may have... persuaded the family here that Nilfgaard is more of a threat than they really are and that it would be in the family’s best interest to pack up and leave. _

_ So you stole their house, _ Jaskier points out.

Yennefer lifts an eyebrow.  _ I consider it to be borrowing. _

_ Sure, just as long as I don’t have to explain to someone why I’m vacationing in their home.  _

She huffs a breath at him in response. 

Neither of them looks at the other, gathering their thoughts. Jaskier fears if he prods too much he’ll lose this tenuous alliance of sorts. He really had not expected Yennefer to offer for him to stay here, but he’s grateful for it. Most of this night has had him feeling lightheaded, like drifting into a dream, and one wrong breath will startle him out of it. 

So even if the fact that Yennefer has now progressed from drinking buddy to temporary roommate seems unlikely, it’s still the offer of a house. A place to land, to rest, to tuck himself away from the world for a little. It feels secure, and that security is a foundation Jaskier thinks he could build himself up from.

Silence presses down in the room as their lighthearted mood tampers. They’ve both had a long night.

Yennefer shifts.  _ I could try to find the mage. _

Jaskier weighs his answer. He thinks he already knows where this road leads.  _ What are the chances that you could find her? And that she would lift my curse? _

Beside him, Yennefer winces slightly.  _ Not very likely, I’d imagine. I can still ask around and see if anyone knows who she is, but- _

_ But no promises?  _ He gives her a small smile in understanding. It’s not her fault that this can’t be fixed.  _ You know, I do need to retrieve my belongings from Oxenfurt since I will no longer be staying there for the moment. _

Yennefer tips her head back against the bed and groans.  _ I am not portaling all over the Continent at fuck o’clock at night. You’re waiting until morning for that. _

_ That’s fair. _

She stands, pauses just briefly, then offers her hand to Jaskier. He takes it and lets Yennefer help pull him to his feet. 

_ You’re welcome to take a room in the meantime,  _ she says.  _ I’ve taken the large one at the end of the hall so stay away from that one if you want to keep all your limbs, but the rest have been mostly cleared out of personal possessions as far as I can tell.  _

_ Thank you, Yen, _ he signs back, spelling out the letters of her abbreviated name.

Several expressions pass over her face, too fast and minute to read. She settles on something puzzled and wry, signs back  _ good night,  _ followed by -

_ What is that? _

Yen looks smug as she repeats the last sign.  _ Dandelion? _

_ Yes. Why? _

_ It's what your name means, isn't it? Dandelion. Jaskier. _

With that apparently obvious statement, she sweeps out of the room. Not like Jaskier had any idea of what to say to that.

He rubs a hand over his face and exhales. This room could be a stable stall behind the world’s shittiest tavern and he would still fall asleep in it. Fortunately, it’s actually nicer than his room at Oxenfurt. Jaskier has fewer problems than he thought he would about sleeping in someone else’s house while they aren’t here and really haven’t invited him in, whether that’s because he’s so tired he doesn’t care or because he trusts Yennefer’s ability to persuade a family out of their own home.

Jaskier strips to his smallclothes, blows out the lamp, and bundles himself under the heavy blankets. The bed is almost too comfortable, but somehow he slips off to sleep, feeling more settled than he has in weeks.

\---

The portal back to Oxenfurt is just as strange as it was the night before - a split moment of empty cold with his organs trying to tug themselves sideways from his body followed by the shock of finding solid ground beneath his feet once again as Jaskier stumbles into the room, blinking away the little late morning sunlight that creeps through the window. 

Yen steps through unruffled after him, grace brought by what he can only assume is years of practice. It’s very unfair of her.

The lute case is first. He flips it open and skitters his hands over everything to ensure it’s all in place. Once that’s secured, Jaskier moves about to gather the rest of his belongings, jamming items into his pack. 

In the middle of scribbling out a quick note expressing his deepest thanks and apologies for his abrupt leave related to vague personal matters, there’s a knock at the door.

Jaskier freezes and looks to Yen. She glares back from where she's stopped meandering around the room and motions at the door with her eyebrows raised. He throws his hands up in a  _ I don't know, what do you want me to do  _ gesture.

"Um, Professor?" a voice calls from outside the door. "Are you there? I just had a question about a song I'm composing, but I can come back later?"

Jaskier shoots a glare at Yen as he moves to the door.  _ Not a word. Don’t want you scaring off my students. _

He thinks he sees her roll her eyes and make a face to show what she thinks of that.

The student on the other side is a young woman he recognizes from some of his guest lectures. She's bright with an ear for good music and a mind for interesting lyrics, but she's been struggling at complementing those lyrics with equally complex song structure.

_ Hello, sorry for the delay,  _ he signs.  _ Of course I have some time to talk about composition! Here, why don't you come in and set it on the desk, and we'll take a look at what you have. _

"Oh, thank you! Um, is there a reason for the handspeech, Professor?"

_ Bit of a sore throat, I'm afraid. Besides, it's always good practice. _

He steps aside to let her through, but she stops on the threshold when she spots Yen.

"Ah! I'm sorry, Professor, I can come back later if you have a guest."

_ No, it's quite alright, _ he reassures. Yen gives the student something that might be called a polite grimace.  _ Besides, I'm not sure I'll have the time later. _

Jaskier clears his note from the desk and lets the student set her music sheets down. She points out her problem and slips into handspeech, speaking occasionally when she forgets a sign. They work through a few different solutions, weighing what she likes or dislikes about each. Most of the time, Jaskier merely needs to nudge her towards a solution before she latches on to it with bright eyes. She just needs a little more guidance and she'll be a brilliant musician before long.

While his student jots some notes down, his eye catches on Yennefer. She's been standing quietly a few feet away with her arms crossed, but she's watching both of them as they've worked. Her eyes meet Jaskier’s on accident for less than a second and she flicks her gaze away, suddenly becoming very intent on checking her nails.

Jaskier hides his smile by turning back to the desk.

It’s only a few more minutes and then his student is gathering her notes and thanking him profusely. There’s a light in her eyes he recognizes - there will most likely be one more new song in the world tonight.

_ Since you’re here, _ he signs,  _ would you mind delivering a note to the dean for me? I’m afraid I’ve had to cut my stay for the winter semester a bit shorter than I had planned. _

“Of course. Is everything all right, Professor?”

_ Nothing to worry about, I assure you, merely some personal business that’s come up rather much sooner than anticipated.  _ He adds a few quick finishing lines to his note, folds it, and hands it to his student. She takes it but doesn’t move to leave.

_ Was there anything else? _

“No, no nothing important, really,” she says in a rush. “Just, um. Well, some of the other students and I were wondering what it was like for you to travel with a witcher. I mean, all the rumors about them can’t possibly be true, right? I don’t mean to be rude! Uh, I know that was kind of a lot…”

The questions about witchers never stop, Jaskier has found, though he can’t fault her for it. She’s young, eager and hungry for the world in a way that makes it all seem so fantastical and faraway yet. Her questions are borne of curiosity rather than malice, as is the case for so many of these students, and Jaskier wants to bundle them all up and keep them that way forever.

What could he even say about traveling with a witcher? That he’s faced more threats in a month than most men will see in their lives. That there were too many long evenings of sitting with anxiety in his stomach, waiting for Geralt to return alive and mostly whole. That he had constant inspiration and the best muse on the Continent. That it had let him see the world in a different light nearly every day.

That he had broken his heart several times over. That he still would have done it again if given the choice.

_My dear,_ he says, _you do not need a witcher nor my words to learn for yourself what is true in the world and what is not. You will have world enough and time for so much._ _But as for your first question,_ he pauses, considers how much to give. _I would say it was a rather enlightening and certainly life-changing experience._

It seems to satisfy his student for now. She expresses her gratitude again and bounds out of the room.

Jaskier allows himself one moment to stand in place and breathe. Then he spins around and sets himself into motion again.

_ Well, that was exciting. Imagine how much you could learn about music from me in just the short time we’ll be together. With my guidance, even you could compose a song, Yen. _

Yennefer stares back at him. He really is terrible at reading her expressions.

_ Just hurry up and gather you things,  _ she says.  _ Being near all these pretentious academics and bards can’t be good for my health. _

Jaskier scoffs but doesn’t rise to her bait. She has a bit of a point with the “pretentious academics” part.

His few unpacked belongings get nestled into his pack. He slings his lute across his back, gives one last sweep of the room, and nods to Yen. One more unpleasant jaunt through a portal leads them back into the entrance hall of Yennefer’s stolen residence.

_ Alright, _ she says while Jaskier tries to regain his footing.  _ I recommend that you do your very best not to bother me for the rest of the day.  _ She stalks off, most likely to the workroom he saw yesterday.

So Jaskier is left to his own devices.

He starts by settling into his room now that he’s retrieved his belongings. He doesn’t have much - never does, too used to being on the road - but the sturdy desk by one of the windows is now adorned with his journal, the few nice quills he has left, and his ink pot. His lute case is lovingly laid where it seems least likely to be stepped on. The dresser is thankfully quite devoid of the previous inhabitants’ clothes, but he discovers a tear in one of his doublets.

“Well, we’ll have to fix that,” he says - or doesn’t, as the curse steals the sound from the words.

_ Ah _ , he mouths silently. Not like he has the option to say it aloud.

Now that he’s paused, the quiet around him becomes so much more noticeable. He’s never been good with quiet. It’s not that Jaskier likes the sound of his own voice, but it’s much harder to avoid all his unwanted tangled thoughts when he can’t fill his background with  _ something _ \- music, his own rambling words, anything.

Fine, there’s a whole house for him to explore anyway. Staying in motion is sure to help, too.

Yennefer’s threats and his own sense of self-preservation, underused though it may be, are enough to keep him away from her bedroom and the workroom, but he figures the rest is fair game.

The most notable points are the library which is full of stacks of half-organized books, the well-stocked kitchen, the suspiciously less full wine cellar, and the back garden which seems to hold several vegetable plots and fruit trees that should be promising for the spring.

As if he plans to stay that long.

As if he has any plan at all.

Jaskier sighs to himself, grabs the torn doublet and his small mending kit, shucks off the one he’s wearing and rolls up his sleeves, and throws himself into a chair in the library where a fire already crackles in the hearth. The perks of having a magical roommate, he supposes.

Stitching is a mostly soothing, repetitive motion, something he’s done enough that he rarely messes up too terribly anymore. It always makes his thoughts go a bit quiet. A skill he learned on the road, done patiently over and over by the light of a fire, watching Geralt demonstrate on his own black clothing. And other kinds of stitches, done over terrifying injuries, trying to keep his hands quick and steady.

The tear disappears under his hands. It’s comforting to see his work make a tangible difference.

When that’s done, Jaskier browses through a few of the books around him, careful not to disturb however the stacks are ordered for risk of incurring Yen’s wrath. He picks up a handful that seem interesting to carry up to his room with the repaired doublet.

He makes dinner later, leaving some for Yennefer who remains hidden in her workroom. Her portion does vanish at some point during the evening, so he considers that a win.

It is so strange, to do all of this alone, neither in some inn nor camped on the road.

He misses Geralt.

The realization slips innocently into his mind. Jaskier nearly drops the plate he’s cleaning.

_ Well that’s not fair, _ he thinks. For his traitorous heart to miss someone who’s hurt him.

Someone he’s loved, too. And that’s the complication, isn’t it?

He misses that quiet, steady presence even as he hears those harsh words spat at him through mountain wind.

Jaskier locks down those thoughts before they get away from him, pushes them to the back of his mind in a never-ending cycle.

His chest aches again, though maybe it never stopped. He doesn’t think about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back to "anything I don't know about canon is free worldbuilding".  
> Yay for the sign language tag being relevant! Some liberties are taken since this is a different world from ours, the characters aren't deaf/hoh, and ASL grammar isn't quite the same as spoken or written grammar. I'm also slowly trying to learn some ASL for authenticity's sake and because I've wanted to for a while, but if anything seems glaringly wrong please let me know!  
> I was going to have Yen sign "buttercup" but it seems like there isn't an actual sign for it apart from finger-spelling, but the sign for "dandelion" is so fun and you should absolutely look it up. (Surprise - this fic is vaguely educational. You get to learn music terms and sign language!)  
> Thank you for reading!


	6. Poco A Poco

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> poco a poco: little by little

Yennefer does not hide. She has no need for it. She does not care who is offended by her and she sees no point in holding her honest tongue. The world has tried to shut her away at so many turns and she has denied it over and over.

Which is why she is definitely not hiding from Jaskier. 

There’s no reason for her to hide from him. It’s her house as much as it is his in terms of ownership (or lack thereof).

But his presence, while mostly silent, is ever-tangible, a pressure hovering just out of sight like a gathering storm. 

It’s only been a few days since the start of their new shared living situation. Yen has done what she can, sent out a few messages with Jaskier’s description of the mage to the people who are most likely to reply - which admittedly is still not very likely - and all but barricades herself in the study and combs over everything she’s already tried in case she missed something. She knows she hasn’t though. The downfall of being an exceptional mage is knowing with absolute certainty when you haven’t made a mistake.

Having Jaskier here should be intrusive, the way she expects it to be, the way it has felt whenever they’ve met over the years with him at Geralt’s side. But he does as she asks and doesn’t bother her while she’s working, and when she pulls herself out of her futile work hours later there’s even food in the kitchen for her.

During these long quiet hours of working solitude, she can’t help thinking of Geralt. He flits in and out of her mind ever since the mountain. It’s easy to fall into the pattern of picking him apart like another problem to be solved, trying to find where it went wrong, what should’ve gone better, what she should do now. Sometimes all Yennefer remembers is cold mountain wind whipping about her, tears forming in her eyes and throat raw from yelling. Sometimes it’s laying in bed together, warm and content and peacefully happy. It takes a lot of effort to not hurl whatever she’s holding at the wall.

It had been a while since she had been foolish enough to buy into the promise of happiness. She really shouldn’t have been surprised to once again find a shoddy illusion.

Once she has exhausted her possible solutions again, she emerges from her workroom, debating whether or not this merits giving an update to Jaskier. The choice is seemingly made for her when, upon opening the door, Jaskier looks up from his book, curled up in one of the library armchairs.

Yen leans against the doorway. Her half-organized stacks don’t seem to have been disturbed, so at least she can get back to that at some point. _Find anything good in here?_ she asks.

_A few good works of fiction and scholarly texts, but whoever maintained this library had very dry taste,_ Jaskier replies with a disdainful look at the shelves. _You’ve been in your workroom for a while._

She doesn’t have to treat it as a question, but there’s no sense in avoiding it. _I haven’t found anything else, I’m afraid. I am still waiting for responses from some mages I know, but I don’t really expect them to be of much help._

His face is carefully neutral, and once again Yen wishes she had some other answer if only to have this solved and over with.

_Thank you for letting me know, and thanks again for your efforts,_ Jaskier says. He makes to pick his book back up.

_You should let me call him here,_ she says. _That’s all that is left._

Jaskier freezes.

_Look, it’s not like I want to see him either,_ Yen continues. _But like I said before, it’s the simplest solution and quite frankly the only one we have remaining._

Jaskier looks at her with flat eyes. _If I had wanted him to know, if I had thought there was a chance he felt the same, don’t you think that in twenty-two years I would have told him? I already told you, it won’t work._

Yen throws up her hands in exasperation. “We have to try _something!_ You’re going to be stuck like this forever because you’re a coward who thinks rejection is the worst thing that could happen to you!” She’s yelling a bit now, fed up with the whole situation.

_Fine!_ Jaskier signs back. _Maybe you two can work out your djinn wish while he’s here and go back to being the perfect couple, since we’re tackling all our Geralt-related problems!_

Yen doesn’t catch whatever bullshit about her problem Jaskier says next because in her frustration she groans and turns away from the library. It’s only a few seconds before Jaskier is on his feet and rounds her shoulder back into her line of sight.

_That’s not fair_ , Jaskier says. His hands shake slightly. _You can’t just turn around because you don’t like what I’m saying. I can’t - that’s not fair._

It sucks all the fight out of her, her mind freezing up, and Yen feels like the world’s biggest asshole. Jaskier can’t _fucking speak_ and his communication has to rely so much on sight now, and she turned her back on him. She may be somewhat of an asshole, but even she can admit that she’s made a mistake.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and then she signs the same: _I’m sorry._

All it took was a moment of forgetfulness, and Yennefer is _better than that._

She was so ready for a fight, for some outlet for her restless energy. She feels drained now, in a way that has become more and more familiar. Whatever Yen is fighting for, she isn’t even sure, and Jaskier wouldn’t be the person to take it out on anyway.

She pushes her hair back and sighs, moving to one of the armchairs and motioning for Jaskier to take the other.

_You’re angry about your problem with Geralt. Don’t take that out on me,_ Jaskier starts, guard still up.

Yen scoffs at that. _I wasn’t-_

_And it’s not fair of you to act as though it’s my fault for getting cursed._

_I was not,_ she tries again.

_You were,_ Jaskier says. _You’re implying that if I speak to Geralt, it would certainly break my curse and not lead to further problems. Or that I should’ve done so already, or - I don’t know, it’s bullshit either way. I know what it sounds like when someone blames me for problems that aren’t my fault._

Yen has been getting defensive again while he’s made his points, because she knows Jaskier is right, but it’s the last bit that gets through to her, makes her stop her thoughts in their tracks. She’s not Geralt. She won’t be the same. 

Jaskier had said they shouldn’t turn the hurt they felt from Geralt on each other. They may be a few steps above drinking buddies now, but the principle is similar. They’re going to have to learn to live with each other or their lives are going to be hell. After all, she invited Jaskier to stay with her.

Yen allows herself a deep breath to center her thoughts. _It’s not your fault for getting cursed,_ she says. _And I am sorry about turning around like that._

_And you’re sorry about projecting your problems?_ Jaskier says, but he’s got an eyebrow raised and the ghost of a smile, so Yen lets it slide and settles for rolling her eyes. _For what it’s worth, I’m also sorry for bringing up the djinn thing._

_If we keep saying sorry, I’m going to throw up,_ Yen replies, and sticks out her tongue for good measure. _It’s too disgustingly sweet._

And Yen can recognize it this time, the slight shift in their dynamic. The way they easily slip away from being at the other’s throat into something a bit more comfortable. It isn’t perfect, and the edge is still there, but she understands a little better how other people make this work, the things you push on and the things you step away from.

It reminds Yen of her brief time at court. Everything was a puzzle there, where plucking on one string of the spiderweb would send out rippling effects across the whole thing, learning who was connected to who in what way and what made them tick in ways that could be manipulated for desired outcomes. This is similar, on a smaller, personal scale. And different, in that her goal here is… absent of manipulation.

_We should stick to handspeech for communication,_ she says. _I know you don’t exactly have an option, but this way I avoid any future mistakes._

He nods in answer. _I’m electing to bring back our rule from our drinking nights about staying away from witcher-related topics as much as possible. And if you want to talk to him and work out your own problems, you’re welcome to do so. But I don’t want to be dragged into it as well. Don’t make your problems mine._

_So stay out of each other’s business?_

_Don’t push it, is what I mean,_ he retorts. _As in, stop pushing me to talk to Geralt._

_Yes, alright,_ Yen signs quickly. _As long as you extend the same courtesy to me, obviously. Anything else?_

They both consider for a moment, Yen’s mind trying to tick over hypothetical scenarios and coming up surprisingly empty. Jaskier shakes his head first. _I’m sure it’ll come up as needed._

There are too many things about their conversation, about what Yen has done, that leave her feeling off-kilter and unfinished. She doesn’t know if she and Jaskier are friends. She can’t even think of a person she would call a friend. Humans are small-minded and short-lived, mages are too entrenched in a system she hates, and everyone else is untrustworthy in various ways.

Yen almost liked it better when they were arguing, if only because that was easy to understand.

But Jaskier is owed more than that. They both are, really.

Many things in life are not worth Yennefer’s time or effort. Every seemingly important thing she tries at eventually ends in disappointing disaster, and she’s found it is much easier to save herself the trouble and never try in the first place.

So doomed though this may be, Yen wants to try it, whatever this is. It’s bound to at least be interesting - a lonely witch and a mute bard, learning to live with each other.

She’s starting to think she might even want them to succeed.

\---

Here is what Yen likes about Jaskier:

When they’ve finished their weird conversation, Yennefer’s stomach loudly reminds her that it’s around lunchtime and she hasn’t eaten since the last time she came out of the workroom, however long ago that was. Jaskier grins and says he was about to make food anyway so she’s welcome to a portion of it again. 

He seems to have explored the kitchen and the available food quite a bit already. More than that, he is shockingly competent in a kitchen, more than she would’ve guessed from his fancy clothes and general unpreparedness for whatever adventure she’s met him on in the past.

_Yes, I have actually learned a few useful things. Despite my amazing appearance, I’m not solely for decoration,_ Jaskier says when she comments on it. _And putting me in the kitchen as a child was the best way to stop me from making trouble. The cook was one of the only people I’d ever listen to apparently, probably because she seemed smarter and wildly more fun than anyone else._

_A cook? So the bard doesn’t come from entirely humble origins. I’d always assumed the ridiculous clothes and extravagant wordplay were part of the annoyance that comes with any bard, but don't tell me you were nobility?_

Jaskier wrinkles his nose. _Still am, I think, at least as far as the title is concerned. Though I’ve not much of the wealth nor responsibility._

All things she honestly didn’t know, though there’s bound to be much more of that. _And what title would that be?_

_Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove. Pleased to meet you,_ Jaskier says with an overdone bow.

Laughter bursts out of her, and she can see Jaskier’s shoulders shaking too. _What the fuck. No you aren’t! Shut the fuck up, you are not a viscount!_

_I am._

_I would never have guessed, considering your abysmal lack of etiquette. Though now I can see why you go by Jaskier._

_Much less of a mouthful,_ he nods in mock seriousness. _Even easier to remember than something like “Yennefer of Vengerberg”._

She smacks his arm for that, both of them snickering. It’s a stupid exchange overall, but it continues to make her break out into grins while Jaskier cooks.

He’s not half-bad - the food isn’t the best she’s ever had, but it’s a fair bit above most dinners served at taverns. And Jaskier has the most uncanny habit of making her laugh genuinely at the things he says.

Though it’s sobering when Jaskier laughs too, silent mirth brought by his curse.

Yen checks her workroom after eating, but there’s no response to her messages.

So she doesn’t linger, just passes through to the library and sets herself back to sorting through its contents.

Jaskier even cleans up the remains of their meal, and when she hears him walk upstairs she assumes they will give each other space for the rest of the day. But it’s only a minute or so until he returns back down and carefully settles himself in the library, lute case in hand.

Yen spares him a glance, but his focus is on his lute. She keeps half her attention on the books and half on Jaskier, just in case he gets too annoying and needs encouragement to leave. He quietly plucks strings and turns pegs until he apparently deems the instrument tuned. 

He follows with a handful of scales and chords, all played at a similar low volume. It isn’t for lack of confidence, but more as though to be unobtrusive. Yen is suddenly aware of how still the room has seemed, how she is so used to the hush of being alone. It feels as though she should hold her breath to make sure this moment isn’t startled away. This is something new, and fragile. There’s never been music in her home before.

And then… light as the snowfall outside, Jaskier plays. It’s a gentle melody, so far from his performance their third meeting. Yen is no musical expert, but the song is beautiful, simple though it is. Jaskier’s hands are sure and his talent is evident as always. 

The most striking difference she hears between the last time and now is how genuine it sounds. Before, there had been a facade filled by emptiness. Here, it surprises her how much depth Jaskier brings to his playing. How she can identify the way he weaves a touch of mournfulness into the music, how a small swell brings a matching feeling to her chest, though she could never explain how she knows this. It’s adjacent to when she channels chaos, that it’s more gut-feeling than conscious thought.

One song flows delicately into the next, and it feels like they have both exhaled. Yen finds her hands slowing as she turns over books and pages, her mind sinking into Jaskier’s music. Many of the songs are subtle and quiet, but he occasionally throws in something that might better be at home in a tavern, which is probably the main thing keeping Yennefer awake at this point. 

When she glances at Jaskier, he’s too absorbed in his playing to notice. He looks so content, so far from the stress of the past few days, and Yen is almost surprised to find the same feeling in herself. Her mind has been blessedly blank, no pressing problems making themselves known. The rest of the world has melted away, save for this room where Jaskier plays music and Yen sorts books, a fire blazing in the hearth and snow falling in the evening outside.

\---

When Yennefer stops to think about it, this may be one of the more strange things that’s happened to her. She dumped a witcher who had been magically tied to her and accidentally became first drinking buddies and now roommates with the witcher’s ex-friend (though she’s not sure if that’s the right word) who is cursed to be silent until he kisses the witcher who is supposedly his true love. And that’s the simplest way of putting it.

_Yes, it is weird._

_I didn’t even finish asking my question,_ Jaskier says.

_Whatever it is, it’s probably weird,_ Yen says.

Yen smirks when Jaskier runs an exasperated hand over his face. _Okay, actually, nevermind. It doesn’t matter._

She would leave it alone as it’s bound to be something she doesn’t care about, but Jaskier is turning an interesting shade of bright red. This afternoon has just taken an exciting turn. _Oh no, no no no, now you have to ask it. Come on, out with it._

Jaskier sighs and quickly signs, _is it weird that I’m here and we both sort of live here in this house and are both, I don’t know, entangled with the same witcher? Is it weird that the way to break my curse is to smooch the man you’re magically bound to? Is this some sort of social faux pas I was not aware of? Actually, come to think of it, it definitely is._

It’s another one of those things Yennefer has shoved to the back of her mind because thinking about it is exhausting. Is it weird? Probably. At this point it’s practically normal for her.

_I think you’re overthinking this,_ she says, aiming for casually uninterested. _In fact, my advice would be to not think about it at all_.

Jaskier, for all that he jokes, can be unfortunately observant. Or maybe just uncaringly nosy. It can be difficult to tell the difference sometimes.

But he pauses, then asks, Are _you in love with him?_

_I don't know, but I'd rather not discuss it,_ she snaps.

Jaskier holds his hands up in surrender then signs, _Sorry. I won't push it._

Neither of them picks up the conversation after that, but it does not stop the thought from nudging her mind now that it's been mentioned.

She has a million unwanted thoughts about Geralt and everything he has brought to her life. There's no need to share those thoughts of course.

But maybe if anyone could understand, it would be Jaskier, who followed Geralt for years around the continent and got his heart broken by the same man who broke hers. Maybe she owes him in some way, for what he has shared with her so far. Maybe there’s no point in either of them trying to hide anything from each other anymore.

Maybe she just wants somebody else to finally hear what she says.

_I don't know,_ she says. _Perhaps I'll never truly know, thanks to him. He was certainly attractive, and good for a fuck. And it was obvious he cares, even though he pretends not to. But how am I supposed to know if what I feel is real or a byproduct of our tied fates?_

She exhales deeply, partially in frustration at her own inability to find a clear answer. _If I loved him… He wanted me, and I wanted to be wanted for who I am, not what I am. We were both ostracized from most other people in a way, and there was understanding between us there. It was enough._

Yen's face feels flushed and she's finding it difficult to keep meeting Jaskier's eyes. She lifts her chin slightly, daring him to say something.

_You care about him though,_ Jaskier says plainly, and it's another one of those things that takes her off-guard and yet is so perfectly Jaskier.

She hums in thought. _Yes. I suppose it's hard not to. But that, at least, I think is real._

Jaskier tilts his head. _You said before that I thought rejection is the worst thing that could happen. It's not. It's never being chosen in the first place. And while I don't necessarily believe he went about it in the best way, he did choose you._

_And what about my choice?_ Yen asks, and she wants to feel bitter. Bitter is easy, it keeps people away from her, it keeps her in territory she's known all her life and made hers. But instead she feels tired of asking the world the same question over and over.

_You choose what to do with it, I suppose,_ he replies with a shrug. _You’re the expert on magic between the two of us, but I don’t think it’s all that cut and dried. It doesn’t have to mean that you have to love him in that way._

_You’re just saying that because you do,_ she jokes, and Jaskier pretends to be offended, and they slip into less emotionally fraught topics, the conversation nestling itself neatly into a corner of her mind to be examined later.

\---

The knock on the door that comes one afternoon is, in a way, expected. Their house isn’t too far outside of the nearest town after all, and Yen has become very familiar with how much people love to gossip. There isn’t much else for them to do out here, especially in the dead of winter.

Yen is also aware that she isn’t exactly a subtle person.

She opens the door with Jaskier peering over her shoulder to find a scrawny young man shivering on the doorstep. It’s always some young man getting sent first.

She arches an eyebrow at him. _I don’t do love potions. Nor will I curse anyone for you. You can all figure out your own trivial emotional problems._

“W-what?” the man says intelligently. More of a boy, really.

_Yes, I am a mage,_ she continues. _And I am willing to hear your request and the requests of your fellow townspeople, as long as they are not completely asinine and I am paid in full for my services._

_Does this happen often?_ Jaskier asks her.

_Unbelievably,_ she responds. _Surprisingly good coin though, you wouldn’t believe the things people will pay for._ She turns back to the man at the door. _Well? What do you want? You are here for some sort of magic, right?_

He looks utterly baffled, but clumsily signs back. _Yes, I would be- very grateful, if you would hear my request._

_Well, you’d better come inside then,_ she says, taking pity on his confusion. _I’m not keen on talking terms in the cold._

Yen sits them in the kitchen and hears out his admittedly boring request - something about a colony of ants that are proving impossible to get out of the young man’s house - but the payment he offers is fair and only requires minor adjusting. It’s only a few minutes in the workroom for her to grind together a simple solution, and when she comes back Jaskier has made tea and is happily chatting away with the man.

_Spread this around the house in areas you want to keep the bugs away from, and a healthy amount where you think the colony mainly resides,_ she says after she’s handed off the bottled mixture. _If they aren’t gone in two weeks, then you can come back for something stronger._

He thanks them both too much and is on his way, hopefully to spread news of Yen’s good will or whatever.

_You do this in every town?_ Jaskier asks when it’s just the two of them again, both nursing mugs of tea. 

Yen shrugs. _Most, if I’m staying for a while. People are eager for magic and word spreads quickly. We’re far enough away from Cintra that people don’t care about the rules, only that someone has an easy solution. It’s a good way for me to make an income, anyway._

_That didn’t look much like magic,_ Jaskier points out. _It looked like a bottle of crushed plants._

_It was a bottle of crushed plants. That doesn’t make it not magic. To me, it’s really just my knowledge of botany and how living things interact in the world. To them, it’s magic - it’s something they don’t know and can’t do but comes to me with apparent ease. Becoming a sorceress isn’t all about magic tricks. That extra knowledge sets us apart._

_Then what else is it about?_

Yen eyes him carefully. _Jaskier, I hope I’m not about to become songwriting material._

_Pure curiosity, I promise,_ he grins back. _Though I could always improve the public’s perception of you with some insider information spun the right way. Another time, perhaps._

_Not while I’m around to hear it. But as I said, it’s not just magic we’re taught. You know that the main reason we’re trained is to be placed in courts someday._ Yen waits for him to nod in affirmation as she considers her words. _It’s all about chaos, in a way, whether in the traditional sense or in the more magical way. We learn how to look at the world and see how to control it to an outcome you desire. Which is why I know how to make it through a royal dinner while preventing anyone from causing a diplomatic incident, and why I know what plants can be mixed together to give you a good time without also killing you._

_And how much would you consider teaching me?_ Jaskier asks. _I don’t mean the magic and the court drama. But the practical things, like botany, which plant has what use. Whatever else you might know._

Yen takes a long sip of her drink. He seems genuine in his question. It would be something to fill their time, at least. _Why?_

_Because I wish to never stop learning about the world. Because your knowledge allows you to see things in a different way, and I want to understand what you see. Because I think it would be fun and you would make for an interesting teacher._

_More like because you’re a nosy bard,_ Yen says, but she had no reason to say no anyway. _Fine, but you cannot assault me with questions all the time. I’ll decide when you’re learning and what you’re learning. And I refuse to teach you how to get high._

_I accept,_ Jaskier says, looking absolutely thrilled in a way that will probably be concerning to her at some later point. 

So their next few weeks contain a smattering of visits from other townspeople with household problems requiring magical remedies from Yen, and brief introductions to common plants for Jaskier. More afternoons of soft lute music are woven throughout this time, along with the general pokings and proddings of figuring out where their boundaries lie. 

Before Yen knows it, nearly a month has passed since Jaskier had joined her. There are fewer arguments between them, though just as many conversations teeter on the edge. There are times when they are both keenly aware of what they have lost. But Yen laughs more, and Jaskier carries more of his signature lightness.

Bit by bit, Yennefer relaxes.

_I fail to see what is so interesting about a blank white landscape,_ she says, yawning one day in the late morning light. _Is this a bard thing?_

Jaskier has been staring out of the kitchen window into the snow-dusted backyard for an unnerving amount of time. His eyes are alight when he responds. 

_There are two chickadees in the garden back there. I think they’ve made a nest in one of the trees._

Yen lets out an amused huff at his excitement, but joins him at the window to catch a glimpse of the birds herself. They’re difficult to make out against the white snow and the dark branches, but she spots small movements flitting about.

_Are they relatives of yours, songbird?_ she teases. _I’m sure they’ll be quite noisy in the spring._

Jaskier scrunches his face in response. _That is the worst nickname you’ve given me._

_Wonderful to know. Now I can use it all the time, songbird._

They gaze out the window together for a while longer, watching fluttering wings in a frozen world. Eventually they move on with their day, Yen using every possible excuse to use Jaskier’s new moniker to her delight and his long-suffering glares.

The next day, the beginnings of a new song start to wind their way through Jaskier’s lute. It’s already the most beautiful thing Yen has ever heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god life has been kicking my ASS a bit lately. Good news though - the google doc for this fic is now over 20k words! Which like holy shit! I haven't written that much in a while!  
> Next few chapters should hopefully be up sooner than this one was (because they're sort of half-written already)  
> Thanks for reading!


	7. Calore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> calore: warmth; so con calore, warmly

Jaskier is well-acquainted with feeling restless. 

It doesn’t mean that he always knows what to do with it, but the feeling is familiar at least. It was part of the reason he took up music and traveling. Being on the road certainly has its drawbacks, but it also tends to not leave much time for restlessness.

Winter is a different story, of course.

Winter so often finds Jaskier on his own for a season, roads too cold for traveling and world too bare for living. It means settling, in place or for less; sometimes both. His bones will ache with more than cold, wanting to be back on the road. He does not do well as a caged bird.

Now, with no lectures to give, no courts to entertain, no voice to fill the quiet, Jaskier becomes more aware of the need to do something. 

He helps Yen sort through the rest of the library. While she works on magical remedies, he assesses what’s been left behind in the house - clothing, trinkets, the odd personal item. He clears these out of his room to rid it of the feeling of living with a ghost.

The storerooms are quite full of food for the winter, but it wouldn’t hurt to see what the local market is like. After making a list of things they might need, Jaskier carefully knocks on the door to Yennefer’s study.

She points at a piece of paper on the table before he can speak. _It might be a long shot at this time of year, but if you come across anything on that list you should grab it._

_And why would I do that?_ Jaskier asks, mostly to be difficult.

Yen gives a long-suffering sigh. They’re becoming very common around here. _You’ve been… organizing things. Making lists and all that. Besides, it’s about time one of us checks out the nearby town, and you’re certainly more of a people-pleaser than I am._

_I’ll take that as a compliment,_ Jaskier says.

_It’s not_ , she replies. _Do have fun, try not to get robbed and murdered and all that._

_I have little control over that, but I'll try not to. I know how much you would miss my dazzling presence._ Jaskier ducks whatever small object she throws at him and graciously snags Yen's list on his way out.

He borrows the heaviest cloak in the house and sets out the next morning.

The world is covered in a light layer of snow, and the cold it brings is tolerable only because of its beauty. Everything is stark monochromatics and muted colors, black branches against white snow and the soft green of conifers. Jaskier watches his breath spiral in clouds in front of him and tucks poetic pieces in the back of his mind for potential later use.

The town is a little more than a half-hour walk away, past frozen fields and a handful of humble houses interspersed with fragments of forest. The people there are nice, though their use and interpretation of handspeech tends to be rough. A few recognize him from their dealings with Yen and stop to make idle conversation, moving on with more excessive thanks and mentions of neighbors who may be in need of Yen's services.

Jaskier doesn't have many stops to make and he finds less than he would have liked, but it's well into the day before he turns for home.

The quiet creeps in gradually as he walks, never complete but such a contrast to how the town felt. Interacting with so many people at once was mildly overwhelming after this past month or so. That isn't to say that Jaskier has ever grown comfortable with silence, but his life has found a balance between two extremes. He’d basically been taught all the best ways to make noise, and his time spent travelling had given him plenty of practice with the quieter parts of life, practice which is now being put to extremely frequent use.

Jaskier brushes as much snow off his boots as he can and steps inside, dropping off what he could find for Yen on some empty table space. She looks up from whatever book she’s perusing and stops dead.

_What are you wearing?_ Yen asks, eyeing his new accessory.

_Don't be rude, Marta gave me this scarf._

Yen cocks an eyebrow.

_You know, Marta, married to Cyryl,_ Jaskier elaborates _. You helped them with...actually I'm not quite sure. I don't think I want to know. It seemed rather private._

_Yes, you did excuse yourself from our conversation quite fast,_ she muses with a smirk. _That is beside the point though, the point being: I don’t remember you_ _helping them with their problem, so why do you get the scarf?_

It’s Jaskier’s turn to raise a teasing eyebrow now. _Yen, are you... jealous?_

_No, I’m not jealous over a scarf, Jaskier,_ she says, and then snatches her new supplies off the table and begins sorting them. 

Jaskier allows himself a small private eye-roll and moves further into Yen’s line of sight. _Look, I’m only saying that you yourself said I am a “people-pleaser,” so it really can’t be my fault if someone wants to gift me a nice warm scarf, did I mention extremely soft as well, and if you had gone into town then maybe you would have been gifted with a scarf as well. Or some other accessory, I don’t know how much of a scarf person you are. Anyway,_ my _point being that I cannot be blamed for surprise scarf acquisitions._

Yen narrows her eyes at him. She’s sporting a light blush that might be embarrassment but is more likely a sign that he may be facing his impending doom, and Jaskier decides it’s time to remove himself from the room.

_Well, you’re welcome for the things, I’m sure you are overwhelmed with joy at my unharmed state and return, so with my job done I shall excuse myself._

_“With your job done?”_ Yen repeats in disbelief. _All you had to do was walk somewhere and talk to people, two things which you should excel at by now._

_Yes, you’re welcome, Yen!_ Jaskier ducks out of the room before Yen can decide to throw something else at him. He pauses in the hall, runs a hand over the scarf. It’s not like he needs to wear it inside. He hangs it up near the door, and if it should happen to move from that spot, well, he misplaces things a lot. It’s easy to turn a blind eye to one scarf.

\---

_I don’t understand the point of this._

_Yen, I swear to the gods, if you don’t shut up I’ll yank that very lovely scarf off your face._

Yen huffs out a breath, a small cloud dissipating into the chill air around them. _I do not see the point of aimlessly walking in the cold when there are plenty of better things for me to do._

_Oh yes? Such as?_ Jaskier gives an exaggerated pause for Yen to respond. She crosses her arms. _Yes, that's what I thought. I know you've already finished with all your current jobs, and both of us seem to be a bit bored of being cooped up inside. Besides, it's relatively nice today._

It's still a cold midwinter day, but the air is mild and the sun peeks through gray clouds every so often. Frost crunches beneath their feet as they stroll down the road. Jaskier had practically dragged Yen out of the house to go on a walk with him as she had been aimlessly pacing around the house for a while.

For all the animosity they’ve aimed at each other over the years, living with Yennefer has been easier than he would’ve imagined. It’s been about a month and half now and neither of them are dead, so he counts it as a success so far. Considering how Jaskier had nearly died the first time they ever met each other, his expectations had been wildly different to how things are actually going.

At any previous time, Jaskier would have said Yennefer was terrifying, deadly, and arrogant. She still is of course, but first impressions are never the full story. 

Yen is a fascinating conversation partner, flipping smoothly between lighthearted quips and glimpses into the depths of her mind. What knowledge he can convince her to share always presents some new way of looking at the world that he never would have seen before. It’s led to a fair share of good-natured arguments as well as a handful of half-formed songs. 

And she listens to his songs, even when she pretends she isn’t. She gives him nicknames, she indulges his rambling tangents, she answers his questions about the materials she has and the uses of various plants. 

The loss of his voice had been - still is - the most frightening thing to ever happen to him, to be made silent so suddenly. Jaskier will open his mouth to speak and every time the ensuing lack of noise reminds him of his curse like a punch to the gut. 

Somehow though, Yen makes it… better. He never feels completely silenced. 

Jaskier’s eye catches on bright blooms that stand out against the snow: a small tree with yellow strands of flowers just off the side of the road. _Look, witch hazel. The perfect plant for you._

_Yes, very funny, dandelion,_ Yen says, and tilts her head slightly in thought. _Did you see the flowers in the back garden? The pale yellow ones._

_Some type of hellebore, right?_ Jaskier says. He watches as her eyes go a bit softer like they do every time he remembers something she’s told him, and she nods in answer. _And they’re poisonous, aren’t they?_

_Toxic is more accurate, but yes. It’s fine as long as you don’t eat them._

_Well, I’m not letting you make dinner tonight,_ he says. 

Yen steps sideways and lightly checks Jaskier with her shoulder, the corners of her mouth tilted up.

Jaskier lets himself drift a bit behind Yen. Then he bends down, scoops a large handful of snow off the ground, and spends a few moments compacting it. And once the snowball is formed, he tosses it and hits Yen square in the back.

He hears Yen’s sharp inhale before she whips around, lips pressed tight together. Jaskier freezes, arm still outstretched. 

_You’re going to regret that,_ she says, and he realizes she’s trying to hold back an evil grin just as she grabs her own handful of snow and smacks Jaskier in the face with a snowball.

Much later, they return home from a fierce battle, both winded and covered in snow and bubbling with laughter, the cold of winter long forgotten.

\---

_When we first met,_ Jaskier signs slowly, _with the djinn._

_What about it?_ Yen replies with a forced nonchalance that means they’re treading on thin ice.

He hesitates, rubs his thumb in small circles on his forefinger. It isn’t exactly a fond memory for him. _I’ve wondered, what did you want with it? I assumed it was for power, at the time, but you aren't exactly power hungry in such an abstract way. So what was it for?_

_For the wishes, obviously._

Jaskier rolls his eyes. _I know. But what were you going to use the wishes for? What is worth trying to capture all that wild power and nearly dying in the process?_

Yen stares at him, and as with many of their conversations he wonders if he’s misstepped. They don’t really argue all that much with each other, not sincerely or about anything that matters too much anyway, but he still wonders sometimes if they’re drawing their lines in the same places. 

Jaskier hasn’t had the time with Yen to truly know her or be able to read her easily. They’re getting there, though. Every piece given and shared is one more than they had before. One more light in the dark.

It’s easier, too, that Jaskier can remind himself every day that Yen chose to live with him. He could be back at Oxenfurt, or anywhere else on the Continent, never having spoken to Yen again, either by her choice or his. 

It’s one of those things that used to scare him, that every day he could wake up and never be quite sure if he was wanted where he was. Jaskier knows almost exactly where he stands with Yen - he’s come to appreciate the bluntness she wields so often. If she wanted him gone, he’d be gone. But every day they both wake up and make the same choice.

Yen stands and puts another log into the fireplace, and though Jaskier recognizes it for the stalling action it is, he says nothing. They’ll probably need to sweep out the ash from the fireplace soon, he notes. They use the library so frequently, spending quiet nights sitting here and carefully navigating through conversations. 

_When I became a mage,_ Yen starts when she’s settled back into her seat, _they took away my ability to have children. I want that choice back. The djinn was a possibility, I thought._

He’s heard the stories of course, of the kinds of “transformations” sorceresses undergo. Jaskier keeps his face very neutral when he lifts his hands to respond.

_I don't want your pity_ , she snaps first.

He pauses. _Did you know what would happen? What they would do?_

Yen inhales deeply. _Yes. I didn't realize it would mean anything to me until later._

_I'm sorry,_ he says. It feels so inadequate, but what else is there? He forgets sometimes how old Yen is, how much longer she has yet to live. How much time for bitterness and regret she has. 

_No comments about me and motherhood?_ she asks. She looks... surprised, he would guess.

Jaskier considers it, then shakes his head. _It's not entirely about that for you though, is it? You said yourself you want that choice. It's the same thing as the djinn wish you're stuck with. Destiny and choice and all that._

The fire swells and shifts the shadows on Yen’s face as she stares at him. _How do you deal with it so calmly?_ she says. _The spell you’re under, the intersection of chaos and magic with your life, the powers you have no control over. How do you not feel as though your life is not your own?_

_Well, I did try having a good old cathartic scream about it, but that didn’t seem to do anything,_ he jokes, just to see Yen make a face at him. _But… I don’t know that I am that much better about it. There’s never one easy fix to set everything right. I make what choices are available to me, no matter how small and insignificant they may seem. Sometimes I like to think that I’m in control of my life, but more often than not I’m choosing how to react to the effects that others have on my life. Our lives aren’t isolated from each other, but they don’t have to subsume each other either._

Yen twists her mouth. _How poetic._

Jaskier shrugs in response. _Sometimes the poetic viewpoint helps. It certainly helps to keep me busy if nothing else._

_Less screaming, more songwriting?_ Yen offers.

_Something like that._

\---

It’s an uneventful afternoon, no different from many others that have passed. Outside is gray and muted with winter chill, the air still and sharp. Inside, fire crackles in the hearth. Jaskier sits in a comfortable chair in the library and plucks away at his lute, aimlessly running through his repertoire of songs. Just because he can’t sing doesn’t mean he should stop practicing, so he makes sure he’s keeping up with his playing.

Through the open doors to the study, he can see Yennefer assessing the supplies in there. She scans along the shelves, occasionally pulls something down and inspects it, and periodically makes a note on what Jaskier suspects is some sort of list of what needs replacing or resupplying. She’s already finished the latest batch of odd-jobs, and within the next few days Jaskier will drag her into town to stock up again. He’ll try to identify useful plants while they walk and Yennefer will complain about the cold and try to trip him into the snow.

But for now, the warmth of the fire is starting to pull him towards sleep. Jaskier staves it off and turns to another song. A simple folk song he learned ages ago, comforting in its familiarity and ease as he plucks out the slow rhythm of it and the lyrics naturally flow through his mind. His eyes are heavy as he stares into the fire, letting his mind drift like the embers.

Another sound begins to wind its way over to his loose awareness and gently slips its way along the melody reverberating from his lute. It’s… the sound of humming, Jaskier realizes lazily. Humming the lines that would be sung. 

He keeps playing, and slowly, haltingly, the hums give way to singing. The words are sung almost casually, absentmindedly, in a way that Jaskier recognizes from beginner musicians who are self-conscious of their singing voice and trying not to give their doubt away.

A small ache goes through him at the thought of singing, and for a moment he is aimlessly jealous and saddened that he can’t sing the words himself. But it is fair outweighed by quiet wonder when Jaskier shifts his gaze over to the study. 

Yennefer continues to inspect and rearrange various items, and now while she works, she sings softly along to Jaskier’s playing.

The room feels fragile and thick like honey at the same time, like a dream Jaskier is trying very carefully to not disturb because he knows how easily it will disappear without a trace. This moment is amber that he is content to be caught in as his muscles smoothly continue the song while his mind savors this tiny unexpected duet. He watches Yennefer scrunch up her nose in distaste at a particular bottle which she sets aside, her voice still following the lyrics as her hands work. She dips and scrapes along the lower register and doesn’t wander too high. She is untrained but not unpleasant to listen to, and sings with the care of someone who is singing simply for the sake of singing. It is the opposite of a performance - small and private, singing only for herself.

He picks through the chorus once more before drawing the song to a close, and Yennefer fades out with it. There is a beat of quiet, filled by the snap of the fire and the clink of whatever bottle Yennefer has moved. And Jaskier begins another song, simple and well-known. His eyes slide closed, and it isn’t long until Yennefer joins in again, first with hesitant humming, then with her voice, muted and low.

When his hands slow their movement to stillness at the end, Jaskier is half-asleep, and between one breath and the next, he floats down the rest of the way to sleep, warmed by more than the hearth.

His return to consciousness takes a long time, the comfortable heat of a well-fed fire trying to persuade him back to sleep, until the cramp in his neck convinces Jaskier to open his eyes. He raises his arms to rub the sleep from his eyes, and a moment too late his brain sounds the alarm that he fell asleep holding his lute and moving his arms is most likely going to send it tumbling to the floor to meet an unfortunate fate. He jolts in some aborted move to catch his lute, suddenly wide awake with panic, and-

And his lute isn’t in his arms. It isn’t in pieces on the floor either, thankfully. A quick look around shows that it isn’t anywhere in his immediate vicinity, but his case is next to his chair where he left it. Jaskier flips it open and exhales in relief at the sight of his precious lute tucked properly into its case. Which is strange, since he definitely did not have enough thought left to put it there when he took an impromptu nap.

Yennefer’s study is empty, but Jaskier smiles, and signs _thank you_ to the empty room. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sometimes it turns out that you wrote stuff in one pov and at some point you decided to move it to a chapter with a different pov while forgetting that this means you have to rewrite it....... I'll be putting on my clown shoes now  
> Thank you for all the kudos and the kind comments which take me so long to respond to because they just make my mind blank out with joy.  
> As always, thanks for reading!


	8. Divisi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> divisi: divided. A directive in ensemble music that instructs one section to divide into two or more separate sections, each playing a separate part.

Geralt doesn't know much about music.

He hears less of it these days. Even in the north, it is dampened by whispers of Nilfgaard and war. The towns he passes through have threads of tension in them, and he does not stay long.

And yet despite the threat hanging in the air, there are always resilient humans carrying on. There are still snatches of music.

Geralt does know what a lute sounds like. 

He also knows that when he does hear one, it’s never exactly right.

He recognizes songs sometimes, when he’s in one place long enough to listen. But even without enhanced hearing, he would know the differences.

So it doesn't matter. It's easy to ignore. It never sounds right, so it will never lead to anything.

None of the music is familiar, but he hears other things that are. Rumours of a powerful sorceress dealing out remedies in another backwater town, and Geralt can recognize that and follow it.

The house he approaches is much quainter than a mayor’s residence, but still more upstanding than many of the houses in the nearby town. The front garden looks extensive with a well-groomed path to the door. Huge trees with snow-laden branches stand to the sides. Snowdrops bloom in boxes beneath the windows. 

It’s very domestic.

Geralt leaves Roach near the path and approaches the front door.

This is most likely a terrible idea.

He knocks anyway and resists the urge to sigh.

When Yen opens the door some long moments later, she doesn’t look surprised.

She’s as intimidatingly elegant as ever, but it’s her eyes that catch him as always, piercing through him like she already knows more about why Geralt is here than he does.

“Yennefer,” he manages.

“Hello, Geralt,” she says coolly, giving nothing away.

She regards him from the doorway, arms crossed and face expressionless. Doubt creeps up in Geralt’s stomach, a feeling that he has recently become more accustomed to. He had known it would be a risk coming here.

“I suppose you’d better come in,” Yen says, and steps aside to give him space to enter.

The house is warm and well-lived in, though whoever occupied it before Yen is now gone. The faint scent of lilac and gooseberries floats in the air, mixed with various herbs and flowers and the smell of old books, and beyond that… something else, unknown but distractingly familiar.

Yen leads him to some sort of sitting room and settles herself in a chair like it’s a throne. Geralt cautiously sits opposite.

Geralt has given thought to this. Traveling the Continent by himself provides plenty of time to think. And this is important to him, so he needs to get it right.

But seeing Yennefer again leaves his mind dangerously empty when he reaches for words.

"You look well,” he tries.

There's a pause before Yen speaks where she lifts her hands slightly, stops, and lowers them. She links her fingers together.

"I am." She doesn’t elaborate. It’s not like Geralt is here for small talk anyway.

So he gathers his thoughts as best he can with Yen sitting a few feet away. "Yen, I came to talk to you. About what happened at the mountain."

She remains impassive. It’s always been difficult for him to read Yen, either because she conceals her emotions or because they flick so fast from one to the other.

Geralt breathes carefully, pulls out what has run through his head so often. Everything he’s thought of has fallen so far from perfect, but he needs to do this.

"I should've told you about the djinn,” Geralt says. “When I tied our fates, it was the only thing I could think of that would save both our lives. But Yen, I swear, I had no intention of creating feelings between us or of binding us in any way."

There’s a feeling trying to claw its way out of his chest and up his throat, but he forces his voice past it.

"You are important to me, and I didn't want to lose you. But I shouldn't have said what I did. I'm sorry."

He looks off to the side, unable to continue holding her gaze. Quiet blooms between them. There’s more he could say, of course there is, but every further word out of his mouth is another that could damn him. He’d been finding it hard to speak at all.

In the space, his hearing picks up on a soft resonating sound coming from somewhere in the house - the second floor, he’d guess. It’s muffled by the walls and slightly disconnected, but musical in nature. It reminds him of watching the first drops of rain falling on a pond, each drop sending out little ripples.

Geralt knows the sound well - it’s the sound of lute strings being plucked. Not as a complete song, but more absentmindedly, hands needing something to do. 

"But you're not sorry for making the wish in the first place," Yen says, and his focus shifts back and the sound fades to the background.

"Yen, it saved your life."

"You can't know that. I would've been fine without it. I didn't need your help."

It’s the same thing she always says. That she doesn’t need help, that she doesn’t need him. "Yen-"

"No, listen to me,” she cuts him off, firm but not unkind. “I appreciate that you think you saved my life, I appreciate that in making that wish you chose me in some way. But even if I had died, it would've been my decision. It would've been under my control. I didn't get a choice. So instead, I will always carry this doubt. I can find my way to forgiving you for what was said on the mountain. I don't know that I can forgive you for making this choice for me.”

Months ago, Geralt would’ve refuted her again, would’ve told Yen that she wouldn’t be able to worry about this if she had died then, would’ve blurted out the first angry words to come to mind. Any impulse that would try to keep from losing her. 

Which had helped drive her away in the first place. And besides, he owes her this choice.

Yen sighs and turns her head so she isn’t looking directly at him. “Look, Geralt, I… care about you. I think that's real. I just- you didn't tell me about this for six years. For all I know, you never would have told me. I need time to make my own decision on what you are to me and how much I want you in my life.”

She speaks a bit softer when she continues, but her tone is final. "Geralt, I'm not saying that this is it for us, that we never have to see each other again. But I am still decently angry with you. I'm not ready to make a final decision on this."

And that’s that. It’s out of his hands. Geralt can’t force Yen to choose him in return. He’s lucky that Yen has given him her time. "Thank you,” he says. “For seeing me at all.”

Yen quirks her lips and stands. He follows suit, and she walks him to the door, though Geralt isn’t sure it’s out of kindness so much as it is to make certain he leaves. 

That faint scent he caught before makes itself known - honey and chamomile - and it’s that smell along with the sound of the lute he heard earlier that makes him stall. A question lies heavily on his tongue, but the thought of any possible answer makes dread pool in his gut.

“Geralt,” Yennefer says when he hesitates by the front door. “Spit out whatever words you’ve been chewing on.”

The house seems to hold its breath like it’s waiting for him to leave. If he could focus for a bit, Geralt thinks he would probably hear another heartbeat belonging to the unseen person who has been hidden away since his arrival. Whoever it is, Geralt has no business regarding whoever Yennefer has chosen to share a home with. 

But the scent and the sound are both achingly familiar. If he does not ask, it will haunt him.

“There is... someone else in this house,” he says, half question and half statement. Yennefer just stares at him. Geralt wants to crawl under a rock, but he asks. “Who?”

Yennefer gives a thin smile. “Nobody you need to concern yourself with.” She manages to make it sound like a polite threat. He has overstayed his welcome.

He gives a small nod and takes a moment to take in Yennefer in all her bright-eyed beauty. Some hard emotion remains in her eyes and lets him know that the two of them are not healed yet, that he is not welcome back to her life yet. They will never be the same as they were, but Geralt allows himself one tiny piece of hope that one day, they will be… friends. 

Letting her go is no easier this time. It is also, he acknowledges, not his decision to make.

“Goodbye, Yennefer.” At least he gets that much this time.

She smiles genuinely, a very small and open expression. “See you later, Geralt,” she responds, and leans up to leave a quick kiss on his cheek before stepping back. 

One last lingering look, and Geralt steps outside and rejoins Roach down the path, who nudges him in greeting. He does not listen for lute music as he leaves. Geralt doesn’t know what he would have done if it had been him anyway.

So he takes Roach’s reins and turns down the snow-dusted path towards Cintra.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *john mulaney voice in geralt's head* I've never really cared about music. never talked about it much. but then, two decades ago, the strangest thing happened


	9. Acceso

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> acceso: ignited, on fire

Jaskier waits until he hears Yennefer yell “he’s gone!” before he comes downstairs. Yennefer is standing by the front door with a pinched expression aimed beyond it.

_How was it?_ he asks.

She exhales forcefully and begins to sign. _I don’t know. He apologized. We talked._

Yennefer throws her hands up in a universal sign of exasperation and stalks off after that, and the next few days are filled with her tense silence. Whatever she and Geralt had said to each other has left Yennefer in some odd unsettled mood. She doesn't seem angry, thankfully, but she has taken to randomly groaning in frustration after long periods of silence. Jaskier decides that in this case it’s best to give her space to work through the feelings that have been dredged up. 

Jaskier doesn’t feel much better himself. When Yennefer had burst into the library to tell him that Geralt was here, his stomach had dropped and his hands had started shaking. Instantly his mind had been flooded with thoughts of the mountain, with _if life could give me one blessing_ and Geralt’s snarl, and Jaskier was _not_ prepared to deal with all of that, much less with the man himself.

He’d frantically signed to Yennefer that he didn’t want to see Geralt and made her swear not to say that Jaskier was here.

_I won’t tell him you’re here,_ she had said after a pause. _If you don’t want to talk to him, I won’t force you. But you will have to at some point, Jaskier. You can’t avoid this forever._ She had shot a meaningful look at him, squared her shoulders like she was going into battle and left the room, and Jaskier had grabbed his lute and bolted upstairs.

Jaskier is nowhere near ready for a conversation with Geralt, even without taking his curse into consideration, but he admires Yennefer’s strength for making the attempt especially when her situation is much trickier. 

However the two of them had navigated the wish had done _something_ to help Yennefer come to terms with it, Jaskier is sure. But a few days ago he also saw Yennefer slam a book she had been reading on to the table and sort of scream with her mouth closed, so it’s hard to tell.

He isn’t all that surprised when, less than a week after Geralt’s visit, Yennefer announces that she’s going out traveling for a bit.

_I’ll probably be back in about two weeks. Three weeks at most,_ she signs.

_Have fun. Be safe,_ Jaskier replies. _Bring me back a souvenir._

She rolls her eyes and steps through a portal to an unknown destination.

_I hope you find what you’re looking for,_ he does not say.

\---

The days pass slowly, without Yennefer here for him to draw into conversation.

Jaskier busies himself as best he can. The library is in a constant state of disarray, so he does what he can to reorganize it. He goes out to the garden to see what winter blooms there are, keeps his mind refreshed on what Yennefer has taught him. They’re in the second half of winter now, though the only promise of spring he can find are a few bold plant sprouts poking up from the ground. It looks like the front yard will have daffodils come April, and undoubtedly by then the chickadee nest will be joined by many more. 

He's had the start of a new song for a few weeks, but when he gives his attention to it now nothing he tries to add seems right.

Words weigh heavily inside of him and resist his attempts to wrangle them into lyrics. Half-composed melodies hum through his lute as he tries to find a resolution. 

His journal accumulates pages full of scribbles and crossed-out lines.

That front sitting room never sees much use, both of them preferring the library or the kitchen, but Jaskier avoids it at all costs now. His body feels coiled tight when he passes the doorway there, like it’s trying to pull him far away. The fact that Geralt had been in this house, in that very room not too long ago, makes Jaskier want to scream. Whether from some form of anger or heartbreak he isn’t sure, but he understands Yen’s need to get the hell out of here.

And though he understands that need, Jaskier is also finding that he misses Yen.

There’s too much quiet without her, for one thing. But he’ll think of something to ask her or some joke to annoy her with, only to look up and remember that she isn’t here right now. The first evening, he’d been halfway to the study with an extra plate of dinner before he’d realized it wouldn’t be needed.

If someone had told Jaskier six years ago that the sorceress threatening him with a knife would be the same woman who sits next to him to watch birds in the back garden, he probably would’ve hurt himself laughing.

The creeping shadow of doubt whispers that maybe he's wrong, maybe Yen isn't coming back. Maybe she's grown tired of Jaskier and has left him as well.

It's a thought he ignores but that is ever-present. And too familiar.

Jaskier starts counting each day as it passes, hoping it will be the day Yen comes home and crushing down his disappointment when it isn’t.

\---

It’s nearly three weeks later when Jaskier hears the telltale vibrating whoosh of Yen's portal. Finally, he thinks with a grin, and something like relief floods through him. He quickly sets aside the bread he’s trying to make and brushes leftover flour off his hands.

_Welcome home_ , he signs as he comes to the front hall, then stops dead.

Yennefer is there, one hand propping her against the wall and the other clutching her stomach with blood dripping between her fingers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> boss makes a dollar I make a dime that's why I write fanfic on company time  
> On a serious note, thank you for the comments and thank you for 100 kudos! That was a VERY exciting little achievement for me :)


	10. Cambiare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cambiare: to change
> 
> * warning for very brief mentions of Yen's past self-harm

Yennefer's exhausted mind thinks _home_ , and _safety_ , and then she's falling through the cold remains of a weak portal. The smell of smoke and blood clings to her, but when her eyes adjust she finds herself leaning heavily on the wall in the entranceway of their house.

Jaskier rounds the corner from the kitchen, halfway through signing _welcome home_. There's a smear of flour on his cheek. It's such a ridiculous little detail that she almost wants to laugh.

Then the easy smile slips off his face. Yennefer feels a bit bad about that for some reason, but her head hurts and her thoughts are too hazy to make sense of much.

She loses some of what happens next, because she bends over to cough, lungs aching, and tastes blood. She blinks and Jaskier's hands are gripping her shoulders, practically taking all her weight, and she thinks _but he can’t talk if his hands are full?_ Her body decides it's had enough as she pitches towards the floor, taking Jaskier with her. Yennefer's last thought before her brain shuts off is that she should probably thank Jaskier later, because he doesn't let her hit the floor when she passes out.

\---

Yennefer dreams.

There is an explosion, and a ringing in her ears.

She staggers towards the gate of the keep, passing bodies in the mud. There is the woman she gave more fletching to, there is one of the young boys who had helped prepare the bottles.

There is Jaskier, face bloodied and unseeing eyes turned to the sky.

_No,_ she thinks. _He isn't supposed to be here._

Yen sinks to her knees next to his body. She knows she has to find Tissaia, has to continue fighting.

But her eyes slide closed and the world shifts beneath her -

Yennefer stands atop a mountain and yells half an argument. She looks around and finds that she is alone. She can't even hear her own voice, words made indecipherable in the wind. She opens her mouth again and -

coughs, and opens her eyes to a bedroom in Rinde. Blood spatters her hand. Despite the metallic taste in her throat, Yen wonders if the blood is hers. It seems urgent that she remember whose blood it is.

Music echoes from somewhere in the house, someone plucking a lute, and as she runs from room to empty room searching for the source, the melody sounds out _but the story is this, she'll destroy with her-_

Yennefer wakes.

The world is nothing but fuzzy gray, though her mind is conscious now.

It takes years for anything to make sense to her. Or perhaps it's seconds? Whichever one is the shorter measurement of time has escaped her mind for the moment.

The first thing she registers is that she's horizontal. So maybe Jaskier did let her pass out on the floor. Well, she would be having words later.

She eventually recognizes that the surface underneath her is much softer than she would expect the floor to be. That, along with the mild weight on top of her, makes her think she's in bed. Which is nice. Maybe she would be having nicer words with Jaskier later.

Awareness creeps in slowly after that. She isn't in agonizing, burning pain anymore, though her whole body aches like she sprinted here from Sodden, so Jaskier must have given her some really good medicine. There are quite a few bandages on her body - wrapped around her midriff, her arms, delicately laced around her hands, patches on her face and neck, and potentially more she isn't noticing right now.

Her mouth tastes like iron and sweet herbs. Yen risks opening her eyes, slowly, and squints at the thin sunlight coming through the curtains into the room. Into her bedroom.

A slight weight lands on her arm, and she shifts her gaze to the side. 

Jaskier sits in a chair at her bedside. He smiles, lifts his hand from her arm and signs, _You’re awake!_ _How do you feel?_

Yen moves to respond despite how heavy she feels, but Jaskier catches her hands and gives them a gentle press down. She stares at the bandages there and remembers the heat of flames.

_It’s okay. You can just speak,_ Jaskier says. _I really don’t want to have to try to rebandage all of that._

“What-” She croaks, clears her throat. “What happened?”

_Well, you should have a better idea of that than I do. I thought you were going out to clear your head or something, and you came back with a stab wound!_

“I wasn’t _trying_ to get stabbed.” Her voice scrapes and she spends a few moments choking on painful coughs. Jaskier hands her a cup of water which Yen gratefully gulps down while he crosses his arms and huffs out a breath. 

She takes this pause to look at Jaskier. There are dark circles under his eyes and his hair looks more harassed rather than artfully tousled.

“You look terrible,” she teases.

Jaskier levels a flat stare at her, which is fair, considering she’s the one laying in bed.

His appearance twists something in her chest and sparks a question. “Jaskier, how long have I been asleep?”

He doesn’t look at her at first. _Three days. Give or take._

“Oh.”

Three days since Sodden. Three days since she’d nearly burned herself out. Yen can feel it, like a hollow space around her bones - when she reaches for chaos, she can’t grasp more than the smallest speck of it before it slips away. Whatever of her body’s reserves she had drawn from to get home had clearly taken its toll, hence the three-day coma. It’s going to take a long time for her to be ready for any kind of magic.

That isn’t even taking into account her physical injuries besides the exhaustion Yen feels from her drained chaos. She remembers Sabrina’s blank eyes and cruel smile and a piercing pain, and Yen gingerly places a hand over the dull ache in her abdomen.

Her arms are both wrapped from her hands near to the elbows in bandages. From the fresh smell of crushed herbs and the cool sensation on her skin there must be something to treat whatever burns she has.

“You did all this?” Yen asks, gesturing aimlessly at the bandages and the fact that she’s tucked comfortably in her own bed.

_Gods, no,_ Jaskier says, _though I admire your faith in me. No, you passed out on me, so I staunched the bleeding on your stab wound and did what I could for the other major injuries, then ran to get the healer in town and brought her back here._

Yen must still be feeling the effects of whatever she’s been given to dull the pain, because her mind isn’t quite grasping Jaskier’s words.

“You... ran into town.”

_We can’t all portal around, Yen._

She does slow mental calculations of the few times she and Jaskier have walked there. “But that’s not very close.”

Jaskier is looking at a spot somewhere near the corner of the bed, and he’s doing that thing where he makes little circles with his thumb against his fingers. There is blood under his fingernails.

_I figured if I got professional help, there would be less of a chance of me waking up to find that you’d bled out in the middle of the night. It would be so hard to get out of the sheets._ He flashes a grin that doesn’t reach his eyes. It fades fast. _And..._

“And what?” she asks when Jaskier hesitates.

He shrugs, a tiny thing. _You wouldn’t wake up. Which is understandable, but you portalled in here half-dead and then collapsed, and then you wouldn’t wake up again, and then the healer took care of you and you still didn’t wake up, and it was-_

His hands stutter briefly, but he carries on with his rambling. _The healer will be back tomorrow. She’s been in once a day to check up on you, but said it’s mostly time that you need. And very minimal activity,_ Jaskier finishes with a pointed look.

“Oh no, I didn’t know you were going to be such a mother-hen about this,” Yen groans. “Next time, just let me bleed out.”

_If there is a “next time”, I’ll stab you myself._

"Mmm, I'm sure. Good luck with that."

_As if you can even_ do _anything right now. I wouldn't even have to stab you - you would collapse trying to get out of bed. You're just like-_

Jaskier stops, resets. He doesn't finish that sentence, but Yen can easily imagine who she is being compared to.

_You're stubborn and you think you're invincible, and one of these days it is actually going to get you killed. But I'm glad it hasn't yet._

She hums softly in answer, not quite sure what to say.

At her side, Jaskier stands from his chair. _Anyway, I’ll let you rest. You certainly need it. But I will have some food ready for you in a bit, and I am making sure you eat it._

Yen is surprised to find that even after such a short time awake, exhaustion is already creeping back in with force. And her entire body still feels like one massive bruise, so she isn’t exactly complaining about the prospect of more rest.

She holds an arm out and flexes her hand experimentally.

“Jaskier?”

He turns in the doorway, eyebrows slightly raised in question.

_Thank you,_ Yen signs.

She holds onto the warmth of Jaskier’s smile as she slips back into sleep.

\---

She had thought it was too late. _You still have so much left to give_ and _You saved me. I won’t ever forget that_ , and of course Yen only ever realizes things just a bit too late for it to matter. Yennefer had been prepared to die if needed, she really had, couldn’t see what was left. She had been a disappointment to everyone her entire life, had never and would never truly be loved, hated so many choices that couldn’t be undone. Hell, she couldn’t even lift Jaskier’s curse, couldn’t bring his voice back to him. What good was she?

And then Yennefer had been in the middle of a battlefield, desperately hoping that Tissaia and all her fellow mages weren’t dead, and…

And all Yen could think about was her home. How she couldn’t bear the thought of Nilfgaard reaching Jaskier. How if something happened to her, he wouldn’t know, might not know for weeks or months. Who would know to tell him? Three weeks, she’d said, and the days would drag on and she still wouldn’t have returned home, and he’d be alone there. Waiting.

She wouldn’t ever get to hear the completion of his latest song.

Yen had accepted her fate, accepted what she had to do to win the battle for them, and even as she had climbed up that rock, wounded and exhausted and determined to do what it took - she had also very much wanted to go home.

It seemed fitting, that moments before she would burn out and die, she would finally realize that maybe life did have something left to give.

She is conscious of the scars on her wrists, now once more covered in bandages.

Though she is loath to admit it, this is the third time in Yen’s life that she has truly faced death, and been saved anyway. First by Tissaia, then by Geralt, and now by Jaskier. 

A memory pries loose, from what feels like ages ago on the dragon hunt. Something Geralt had said to her, about how she doesn’t need to do everything on her own. Ironic, coming from him. It isn’t an idea that sits easy with her - it never has. 

But Yen is lucky to be alive. She didn’t need the healer to tell her that, though the list of her injuries made that fact abundantly clear: a puncture in her gut from an arrow, burns on her hands and forearms, a handful of splinters and shrapnel wounds, a general case of exhaustion. 

And most dangerously, her depleted chaos. Depleted so thoroughly that she had come very close to being dead on arrival. The healer says that as far as she can figure, Yen had made up for her lack of chaos by unconsciously pulling on her body’s own energy to form that one last portal home. It will take time to work up her strength again, physically and magically.

Jaskier doesn’t say much about the days she was unconscious, and that absence of words is how Yen knows how close she cut it. She has come to understand that Jaskier does not often talk about the things that worry him the most.

Instead he complains about the bloodstains that will just absolutely never come out of the floor in the front hall or about the people from town who came by to ask for something from Yen only for Jaskier to have to turn them away.

She does not have much strength for conversation, but she watches Jaskier go on tangents of the small events that passed while she was gone. In return, Yen does give him a brief summary of what had happened at Sodden. There is much she leaves out.

More than once Yen falls asleep while Jaskier sits a strange vigil at her bedside, periodically accompanied by his lute. 

_Gods,_ but she missed him. 

“I heard the most _interesting_ little song while I was out traveling,” Yen says offhandedly one day. “What was it called again? A Saccharine Smooch? Her… Sugary Kiss? Her Delicious Lip-Locking?”

Jaskier turns bright red.

“Whatever it was, the subject matter was quite… fascinating. Almost familiar, one might say, especially when I’d heard it was written by _you_.”

_I hate you. I absolutely hate you. I’m going to write a hundred insulting ballads about you._

Yen barely refrains from cackling in delight. “No, no, I mean, I’m flattered, really, that you would write such a nice song about me. It seems like it’s a popular little tune.” 

_I do find it important to inform you that whoever played it is a talentless hack and they will never come close to the original._

“Of course,” she says, and gives in to her laughter when Jaskier glares back.

Yennefer is glad to be home. It is a novel feeling to even have a place to willingly call home.

She had left in search of… something, those three weeks ago. Peace of mind, maybe. She had sought distance from Geralt and the connection they have, and in doing so eventually led herself to Istredd. The first person she loved and who had loved her in return. A love based not in destiny or djinn wishes, so perhaps there was still something there between them.

Even as she’d kissed him deeper, searching for that spark, that connection, that choice, Yen had found it empty. She and Istredd were different people now. Whatever they had once shared, whatever she was once again looking for, was gone.

He had walked away from the table, and Yen had felt loveless and alone in a way she hadn’t felt since she had been a young girl sleeping in a pigpen.

And then Vilgefortz and Aretuza again and Sodden, covering everything she felt with bitter anger and adrenaline.

And finally, miraculously… home.

“Jaskier?” she says quietly.

He looks up briefly from where he is carefully rebandaging her hands the way the healer showed him, meets her eyes to let her know he is listening.

Yen swallows thickly around the words in her throat. They are uncomfortable, unfamiliar in their lack of barbs.

“Thank you. For saving me.”

Jaskier tucks the wrap closed with a soft smile and replies, _Of course._

\---

It’s late evening when she wakes. Yennefer slides out of bed, legs unsteady when her feet hit the floor.

She stands, surveys the room. There’s… something she has to do. Something urgent.

The warding! She has warding around the house, protection from other mages and the like. It’s weak now, though, she remembers with a frown. It needs to be fixed.

The hallway is dark and hazy, and it takes a moment for her eyes to adjust. She grips the railing tight as she descends the stairs, one shaky step at a time.

Then towards the front door, and she’s turning the door knob when someone places a hand on her shoulder.

“Oh.” Yen blinks. It’s Jaskier.

_I don’t think you’re supposed to be out of bed right now. What are you doing?_

“I… wards. I have to reinforce the warding around the house.”

_Yen, I don’t think you have enough strength for that._

She furrows her brow, shakes her head. “No, I have to. It’s - It’ll stop them from finding us. It’ll keep us safe from Nilfgaard. I have to redo them, and add more.”

Jaskier nods slowly. _Okay. Okay, how about you do that after you’ve rested. Alright?_

Yen sways where she stands. Rest. That sounds nice. Her hand slips off the door. “Mm. Alright.”

She lets Jaskier take her arm and lead her back upstairs. He’s supporting most of her weight by the time they get back to her bed. Yen climbs in and when her efforts to pull the blankets back up fail, Jaskier takes over and finishes tucking her in. Sleep reclaims her before he’s left the room.

\---

Yen heals slowly. 

Jaskier is a constant presence at her side, bringing her food, redressing her injuries, helping her out of bed even as she tries to wave him off. He merely glares back at her when she does this, and Yen will acquiesce and point out that he can be just as stubborn as she is.

The first week had consisted mostly of sleeping, but now coming to the end of her second week home Yen has enough energy to stagger around the house by herself for a bit. 

The bandages are gone from her hands which are surprisingly intact. She watches Jaskier check her stomach wound, his tongue poking out in concentration as he considers and then recovers it.

_Well, you’re going to have a scar there, nothing to be done about that, but it does seem to be healing up nicely,_ Jaskier tells her.

_Not the first one I own,_ Yen signs in return.

_If you keep out of trouble, maybe it can be your last. Anyway, you’re fine to go run yourself ragged for the rest of the day as you are so wont to do._

As much as she would like to enjoy her freedom from being essentially bedridden, Yen is on edge. Since morning today, she’s felt a tightness from somewhere behind her ribs that had solidified into an unsettling _pull_.

She knows that feeling. It isn’t strong exactly, but years of familiarity have allowed her to pinpoint it.

And Yen knows that the day is going to go to shit.

It’s the same sensation she had before Geralt showed up a little over a month ago, slowly growing more insistent through the day like an itch she can’t ignore but can’t scratch.

It takes until afternoon for there to be a knock at the door. Yen knows it isn’t one of the townsfolk, just like she knew last time. 

Jaskier, of course, is not tuned into the same thing she is sensing and moves to answer the door. 

She calls after him, perhaps to stop him or warn him, but he waves dismissively in an “I’ve got it” motion.

So Yennefer trudges down the hall behind him, just in time for Jaskier to open the door and bring them face to face with a young girl and Geralt of Rivia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
